I'll be back later. I'm going out to get myself a plate of alfreido, a big ass pecan pie - and butter tarts. Lots of butter tarts.
The new analysis found that obesity - being extremely overweight - is indisputably lethal. But like several recent smaller studies, it found that people who are modestly overweight actually have a lower risk of death than those of normal weight.
I know it's a long shot, but you know - if there's just a slight chance an extra five pounds means I'll have a a lower risk of death, where's the harm?
Last year, the CDC issued a study that said being overweight causes 400,000 deaths a year and would soon overtake tobacco as the top U.S. killer. After scientists inside and outside the agency questioned the figure, the CDC admitted making a calculation error and lowered its estimate three months ago to 365,000.CDC Director Dr. Julie Gerberding said because of the uncertainty in calculating the health effects of being overweight, the CDC is not going to use the brand- new figure of 25,814 in its public awareness campaigns and is not going to scale back its fight against obesity.
"There's absolutely no question that obesity is a major public health concern of this country," she said. Gerberding said the CDC will work to improve methods for calculating the consequences of obesity.
Dr. JoAnn Manson, chief of preventive medicine at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, said she is not convinced the new estimate is right.
"I think it's likely there has been a weakening of the mortality effect due to improved treatments for obesity," she said. "But I think this magnitude is surprising and requires corroboration."
It reminds me of a news report I heard over radio last summer, announcing that men who quit smoking by the age of 50 "cut their risk of death" by a whopping 50%.
All my life, I've assumed "risk of death" to be 100%. it makes me wonder why more men don't take up cigarettes, just so they can quit and double their chance at immortality.
I wonder if they're allowing for modestly overweight people being less likely to spend their weekends mountain climbing, jogging after dark, etc?
Cool, I'm gonna light another smoke, and if I die early, I'm gonna sue dammit.
LOL - Thanks! I'll just carry on exercising vicariously when my colleagues go to the gym, and remain at a lower risk.
You made my day.
Great! That gives me a whole 15 years before I have to quit and then I'll live to infinity/2.
Cheers!
lance
I'm doing what I can to punish you all with my presence as long as I can get away with. My secret: a regular vigorous routine on the proverbial marital workbench. I suspect that the truly obese are missing out on this too oft overlooked exercise gem - for reasons that are perhaps too difficult to find. But I have found that there's nothing else like dark beer, green vegetables and a good old heave-ho every now and then - it does wonders for the heart.
Pecan pie and butter tarts? Do you follow that with a coffee and an espresso?
I keep thinking about a quip by comedian Stephen Wright:
"I plan to live forever... so far, so good."
We're all immortal, til we die.
When my uncle was 93 years old, the nursing home where he was staying, agreed to let me spring him for a couple of days, and take him to visit his brother, ( my Dad). They packed a suitcase for him, gave me his pills and times he was to take them, and off we went. When I returned him to the nursing home, I was invited to have a cup of tea with the woman who runs that place. I told her that everything was exactly as she said it would be: he wandered in and out of Alzheimer's, and I was prepared for that- thanks to her. My only problem, was that he was a heavy smoker...?
She replied, ( in exasperation) 'What do you suggest I do- he is 93 years old. Do you expect me to take his cigarettes away from him?"
What is the link, between tobacco and Alzheimer's? And since autopsies are rarely done on the elderly, do we miss the visible signs of BSE?