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Am I Overweight? |
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Body mass index (BMI) is
measure of body fat based on height and weight that applies
to both adult men and women. Two people can have the same BMI,
but a different percent body fat. A muscular person with a large
muscle mass and a low percent body fat may have the same BMI
as a person who has more body fat because BMI is calculated
using weight and height only.
| BMI |
Weight Status |
| Below 18.5 |
Underweight |
| 18.5 –
24.9 |
Normal |
| 25.0 –
29.9 |
Overweight |
| 30.0 and Above |
Obese |
How to measure BODY FAT: Your Fat Calculator
When it all comes down to losing
or gaining weight, most people turn to the scales to determine
how much they should lose or gain to have the weight or the
shape that they desire.
However, health experts said weight alone is not a clear indicator
of good health because it does not distinguish between pounds
that come from body fat and those that come from lean body mass
or muscle.
Being over fat and overweight is not the same. Overweight simply
means an excess of total body weight based on population averages
for heights and body frame sizes. On the other hand, obesity
is defined as an excess of body fat regardless of weight.
What we have to consider, experts said, in order to determine
our fitness, is to know our body fat. Remember that body fat
is a percentage of your total weight, so even slender people
can have dangerously high levels of body fat. (See
Here are three ways of measuring your body fat:
1. Home Body Fat Scales-- Body fat scales claim to measure body
fat quickly and conveniently. These body fat scales use the
Bioelectrical Impedance method to measure your body fat percentage.
A low-level electrical current is passed through your body and
the "impedance", or opposition to the flow of current,
is measured.
2. Skin fold Calipers-- Calipers are a tool that looks somewhat
like a giant tweezers. These are used to grasp your skin folds
at different points on your body and measure the thickness.
These measurements are then compared to standard values for
persons of your age and gender to give you your estimated body
fat.
3. Hydrostatic Weighing-This is just a fancy term for underwater
weighing. You sit on a scale inside a tank of water and blow
out as much air as you can. You are dunked underwater, where
you blow out even more air. Since fat is lighter than water,
the more fat you have, the more you will float. The scale measures
underwater weight to figure out body density. The margin of
error is around 2-3%, but the accuracy depends on the amount
of air you expel. You have to blow it ALL out or it will not
be as accurate. This is a difficult way to measure body fat
since it can be uncomfortable and even scary to be dunked underwater
with no air in the old lungs. FastFatReduction
The Epidemic called OBESITY
Obesity has become a global pandemic
affecting the lives and health of millions of people, according
to the World Health Organization. It is an accelerating social
problem in industrialized countries and is also growing in the
former colonial world.
Obesity is very often defined as an eating disorder. However,
it is not a simple condition of eating too much. Health experts
believe that obesity is a serious and chronic disease prevalent
in today's society.
As the "obesity epidemic" increases, so is the number
of people that suffers from it. Approximately 300,000 adult
deaths in the United States alone each year are directly attributable
to unhealthy dietary habits and physical inactivity or sedentary
behavior or obesity. In the United States alone, nearly one
third of the adult population is obese. In the Europe, they
have a similar encounter of the disease. An astonishing 58 per
cent of Britain's adult population is considered overweight
or obese, a report published in England said. The National Audit
Office of Britain reported last year that 20 percent of British
women and 17 percent of men were as much as 70 pounds heavier
than the recommended weight for their size.
Obesity is not just a health issue. It is also considered as
a socio-economic problem that utilizes $117 billion per year
in the United States alone. In Britain, obesity cost £2.6
billion in NHS bills and indirect losses to the UK economy.
At least 18 million sick days a year can be attributed to obesity,
it says, and the increased risk of heart disease, diabetes,
colon cancer and stroke reduces life expectancy by around nine
years.
When it comes to explaining these trends, not only media reports,
but many scientific articles disparagingly refer to a combination
of fast food, increasing car ownership and a sedentary lifestyle
in front of television sets or computer monitors.
In the first place, such generalisations are often backed by
little substantiated data. Some studies have found that the
prevalence of obesity among children is directly related to
the hours of television viewed, for example, but other studies
have failed to establish a correlation.
More fundamentally, these observations ignore the economic and
social driving forces behind the changes in diet and lifestyle-including
the profits generated by the food and entertainment industries-and
the intense pressures caused by increasing working hours and
declining living standards for the majority of working people.
Obesity can also lower the life expectancy of individuals. In
addition to this, obese people are increasing their susceptibility
and risks to a number of diseases directly related to obesity.
This includes: type 2 (adult onset) diabetes; high blood pressure;
stroke; heart attack; heart failure; cancer such as cancer of
the colon or rectum; gallstones; gout and gouty arthritis; osteoarthritis;
sleep apnea; and pickwickian syndrome.
Article provided by: FastFatReduction
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