# Unisex Definitions of Overweight and Obese **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 22, 2012, 8:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819 "2012-12-22T08:56:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 8:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/1 "2012-12-22T08:56:29Z")
I was researching diet, weight loss, and obesity the other day online and I was surprised to learn that the Center for Disease Control has a unisex standard for “overweight” as well as for “obese.” This strikes me as ridiculous. Everyone knows that a fit man is significantly heavier than a fit woman of the same height. Because men are naturally more muscular. Putting common sense aside, just look at life insurance actuarial tables. The height and weight charts are shifted to heavier ranges for men. Of course, insurance companies are in business to make money. If they have concluded that a healthy weight range for men is higher than a healthy range for women, to me it’s very credible. Am I missing something important here? Does anyone wish to defend these standards? And why would the government define things this way? Is it political correctness run amok? Are The Powers That Be unwilling to accept that obesity is a bigger problem among women than men? ---
**Author:** ![DataX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@DataX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DataX)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 9:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/2 "2012-12-22T09:31:34Z")
BMI is a simple measure - which is what is used as the cutoff for obese and overweight - and virtually everyone who is considered obese from the standard would be considered fat. Plenty of people pick on BMI as a standard - and yes some athletes would be considered overweight, but let’s face it - the US is not a nation of athletes. Studies have shown relatively similar ranges for attractiveness based off BMI for men and women. It has nothing to do with political correctness. Different studies are free to use whatever cut offs they want for women and men - and often do. Sometimes it looks like it doesn’t make much of a difference: > **[healthhubs.net - healthhubs Resources and Information.](http://ww1.healthhubs.net/diabetes/lifetime-diabetes-risk-more-than-70-when-bmi-is-greater-than-35/)** > > healthhubs.net is your first and best source for all of the information you’re looking for. From general topics to more of what you would expect to find here, healthhubs.net has it all. We hope you find what you are searching for! Sometimes it does: [http://www.metacure.com/about-diabetes-2/diabesity/](http://www.metacure.com/about-diabetes-2/diabesity/) But diabetes will have the biggest correlation to BMI with any disease I know - and probably the biggest difference between the sexes. Look at the chart on this page - other than the very obese - they are basically identical: > **[Dr Gily's Ideal Weight and BMI Calculator.](https://www.drgily.com/ideal-weight-bmi-calculator.php)** > > Dr Gily's Ideal Weight and Body Mass Index Calculator. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 9:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/3 "2012-12-22T09:56:33Z")
> [@DataX](#): > > It has nothing to do with political correctness. Different studies are free to use whatever cut offs they want for women and men - and often do. But I’m talking about the US government standards. > [@](#): > > Sometimes it looks like it doesn’t make much of a difference: > > [OXSLOT88: Situs Slot88 Gacor 2025 Deposit Qris Terpercaya Gampang Maxwin](http://healthhubs.net/diabetes/lifetime-diabetes-risk-more-than-70-when-bmi-is-greater-than-35/) Actually this cite contains a great example of my point. According to the study, a man who is “overweight” has about one and a half times the risk of diabetes compared to a man who is “normal weight” At the same time a woman who is “overweight” has about double the risk of diabetes compared to a woman who is “normal weight” Why is being overweight dramatically more hazardous for women than for men? The answer (I believe) is that it isn’t. It’s just that “overweight” is defined more strictly for men. A man with BMI 26 has much less of a weight problem than a woman with a BMI of 26. ---
**Author:** ![DataX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@DataX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DataX)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 10:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/4 "2012-12-22T10:06:31Z")
I used the diabetes as an example of where there is a difference, for many things - like the last link - there isn’t one. If you look at overall mortality - it is actually higher for men (white) of the same BMI [http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1000367](http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1000367) I get your point - and think it has merit, but for many diseases the risk profile is similar. In fact - other than diabetes - most diseases don’t start having a significant effect until after 25-30. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 11:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/5 "2012-12-22T11:01:31Z")
> [@DataX](#): > > I used the diabetes as an example of where there is a difference, Actually, the first link you provided was under your statement that “Sometimes it looks like it doesn’t make much of a difference” > [@](#): > > for many things - like the last link - there isn’t one. If you look at overall mortality - it is actually higher for men (white) of the same BMI > [http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1000367](http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1000367) > [@](#): > > I get your point - and think it has merit, but for many diseases the risk profile is similar. In fact - other than diabetes - most diseases don’t start having a significant effect until after 25-30. Thank you, I guess. Assuming that “overweight” and “obese” should be defined in terms of additional serious health risk, the question is whether the life insurance companies have it right or not. I am inclined to think they have it right, i.e. that weight ranges should be shifted up for men. ---
**Author:** ![sandra\_nz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/eada6e/32.png) [@sandra\_nz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sandra_nz)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 11:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/6 "2012-12-22T11:02:21Z")
Shouldn’t it just be based on body fat percentage? Having large muscle mass doesn’t cause any health issues, does it? ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 11:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/7 "2012-12-22T11:42:50Z")
> [@sandra\_nz](#): > > Shouldn’t it just be based on body fat percentage? Well apparently body fat percentage is difficult to measure. But even if they went by body fat percentage, different standards would be appropriate for men and women. A fit woman has significantly more body fat than a fit man. > [@](#): > > Having large muscle mass doesn’t cause any health issues, does it? I haven’t seen studies, but I would guess that it does to some extent. I imagine it’s difficult to measure because muscle mass is probably correlated with other factors which have their own effects on health and longevity. Actually the same is probably true about fat. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/8 "2012-12-22T14:32:31Z")
For anyone interested: [Healthy waist may be a bit bigger for black women](http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/01/25/us-healthy-waist-idUSTRE70O4H320110125) ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/9 "2012-12-22T14:50:53Z")
The BMI is a means of describing _statistical_ normal that has been adapted for helping to determine what is health outcomes “normal.” The exact cut-offs used were a bit arbitrary and chosen to make it easy to implement clinically. The first crack at it was to use the 85%ile of the then normal distribution, 27.8 for men and 27.3 for women, as being “at risk” for obesity. That was then simplified to a uniform 25 as overweight and 30 as obese for ease of use and only that. It is taken too seriously and rigidly by most, including those in healthcare. But in reality the male and normal percentile distributions did not and do not differ much. The man at 50%ile BMI has less fat and more muscle than the woman at 50%ile but they are at nearly the same BMI number. Yes, other measures may be more useful than BMI - body fat percentage and where that fat is - but BMI is still a fairly useful _screen_. (And more muscle mass lowers health risks in general, improves insulin sensitivity, etc.) ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/10 "2012-12-22T15:04:53Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > That was then simplified to a uniform 25 as overweight and 30 as obese for ease of use and only that. Would it really make things unbearably more complicated to have a different number for men than women? I don’t think so. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/11 "2012-12-22T17:04:07Z")
No it wouldn’t. That said the difference between the numbers (27.3 and 27.8) is insignificant at the 85%ile (and other percentiles) and of no apparent prognostic significance. (For both it seems the lowest health risks are correlated with the 24 to 26ish range.) It is more a tribute to how little the powers that be thought of practicing clinicians that they felt they needed to round 27 and change to 25 (and 30 for obese) or else it would too complicated for them to use. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/12 "2012-12-22T17:28:42Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > No it wouldn’t. That said the difference between the numbers (27.3 and 27.8) is insignificant at the 85%ile (and other percentiles) and of no apparent prognostic significance. Choosing the borderlines by percentile is silly. It presumes that men and women are equally prone to obesity. Clearly women are more prone to being overweight and obese than men. Even by the current ridiculous unisex standard, more women than men are obese. The borderlines should be drawn by looking at excess risk of serious health problems. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/13 "2012-12-22T18:15:25Z")
> [@brazil84](#): > > Choosing the borderlines by percentile is silly. It presumes that men and women are equally prone to obesity. Clearly women are more prone to being overweight and obese than men. Even by the current ridiculous unisex standard, more women than men are obese. > > The borderlines should be drawn by looking at excess risk of serious health problems. Excess risk correlates just as well (and as poorly) with BMI in both genders. Measures of central obesity correlate better in each as well. A woman and a man are not equally healthy at the overall percent body fat. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/14 "2012-12-22T18:37:24Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > Excess risk correlates just as well (and as poorly) with BMI in both genders. I’m not sure what your point is here. Are you saying that the insurance companies are wrong? I mean, if you look at actuarial tables, the BMI border for men between the most preferred risk category and the next category is significantly higher than for women. And of course insurance companies are, at least in theory, trying to assess excess risk. Are you saying that they are wrong to make the BMI limit higher for men than for women? > [@](#): > > Measures of central obesity correlate better in each as well. A woman and a man are not equally healthy at the overall percent body fat. That may be so, but so what? All that means is if one were to measure obesity in terms of body fat, the thresholds should be different for men and women. Which I agree with. ---
**Author:** ![DataX](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@DataX](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DataX)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/15 "2012-12-22T18:46:35Z")
Are you talking about the tables that Break into small, medium, and large frame? If so - this is just one method for them to Break stuff up. Women have higher life expectancy - so it wouldn’t be odd for the tables to be adjusted somewhat. It doesn’t necessarily mean that the overweight category for men is paying the same ratio that the overweight category to women is. The chart I found was about a 7 pound difference at ~160 lbs 5’10. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/16 "2012-12-22T18:55:43Z")
> [@DataX](#): > > Are you talking about the tables that Break into small, medium, and large frame? Not necessarily. > [@](#): > > Women have higher life expectancy - so it wouldn’t be odd for the tables to be adjusted somewhat. I don’t think that matters so much. Because the question is where you draw the line between people in the healthiest weight range the next healthiest weight range. > [@](#): > > It doesn’t necessarily mean that the overweight category for men is paying the same ratio that the overweight category to women is. I agree, but still, the only reasonable way to interpret the actuarial tables is that the insurance companies believe the healthiest weight range for men is a bit higher than the healthiest weight range for women. ---
**Author:** ![Michael63129](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3da27b/32.png) [@Michael63129](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Michael63129)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/17 "2012-12-22T21:45:05Z")
> [@brazil84](#): > > Why is being overweight dramatically more hazardous for women than for men? > > The answer (I believe) is that it isn’t. It’s just that “overweight” is defined more strictly for men. A man with BMI 26 has much less of a weight problem than a woman with a BMI of 26. That’s only true for diabetes and is likely due to gender differences; by contrast, a man’s risk of cardiovascular disease increases faster with BMI. In fact, according to [this study](http://www.medicine.ox.ac.uk/bandolier/booth/hliving/bmiwords.html), men have a higher relative mortality risk at BMIs above 28, especially at the highest BMIs where relative mortality between men and women nearly doubles (it does note that the optimum BMI for men is slightly higher, 23.5-24.9 vs. 22.0 -23.4 for women; both of these ranges are also on the higher side of “normal”, 18.5-24.9). ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/18 "2012-12-22T21:51:52Z")
> [@Michael63129](#): > > That’s only true for diabetes and is likely due to gender differences; by contrast, a man’s risk of cardiovascular disease increases faster with BMI. In fact, according to [this study](http://www.medicine.ox.ac.uk/bandolier/booth/hliving/bmiwords.html), men have a higher relative mortality risk at BMIs above 28, especially at the highest BMIs where relative mortality between men and women nearly doubles (it does note that the optimum BMI for men is slightly higher, 23.5-24.9 vs. 22.0 -23.4 for women; both of these ranges are also on the higher side of “normal”, 18.5-24.9). Let’s cut to the chase: Do you think the insurance companies have it wrong when they have a higher weight cutoff for men to be in the most preferred risk category? ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/19 "2012-12-22T21:57:57Z")
I cannot speak to what insurance tables, old or recent, are based off of; I can speak to what the medical literature actually has found. Based on the scientific literature what you seem to infer from whatever insurance tables you are looking at, is in fact wrong. Perhaps those tables were based off of the best available once upon a time, perhaps not, but not on what is currently known. From a pooled analysis of prospective studies which included [1.46 million adults](http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa1000367#t=articleTop) (this analysis White non-Hispanic), the [mortality curves by BMI](http://www.nejm.org/action/showImage?doi=10.1056%2FNEJMoa1000367&iid=f01) in both male and female total and non-smoker only groups were very similar, especially for non-smokers. So much so that they pooled the results for other potions of the analysis. As **monstro** references, the same exact mortality implications [may not hold for Blacks](http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/content/176/5/431). (And note, no statistically significant difference between male and female mortality by BMI there either.) That information is still forthcoming and somewhat contradictory and controversial but there [may be](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3507927/) a gender gap there - with “overweight” by BMI (25 to 25.9) being a mortality risk for Black males more than Black females, and “obese” (over 30) for both. > [@](#): > > In this prospective cohort study following 16,471 black men and black women for an average of 13 years, we found a non-linear association between BMI and total mortality: compared with BMI between 20 and 30, BMI above and below this range were related to an increased risk of death. We also found that the association became more pronounced when the analysis was restricted to individuals who were never smokers. > > A limited number of studies have examined the association between BMI and total mortality in blacks and have reported inconsistent results. Several studies suggested an increased risk of death with higher BMI [9], [14], [15], [21] while others found no association between BMI and total mortality [5], [6], [7], [8], [10], [11], [22]. Earlier studies, such as a study of black members of the Kaiser Foundation Health Plan in northern California in 1966–1973 [5] and the Charleston Heart Study [6], [7], found a J-shaped association between BMI and total mortality in black men, but no association in black women. In a few subsequent studies, however, no relation of higher BMI to total mortality was observed in either black men or black women [8], [10], [11], [22]. … > > … Our finding of a positive association between BMI and total mortality in black men is consistent with the findings in whites: the RR of 1.56, 2.48 and 2.80 for class I, II and III obesity, respectively, found in black never smokers in our study were very similar to corresponding RRs of 1.44, 2.06, and 2.93 observed in the pooled analysis of 1.46 million non-Hispanic white men [3]. Also, the lowest mortality rate was found among black men with BMI 22.5–\<25 in our study and white men in the pooled analysis [3]. > > On the other hand, the relation of BMI to total mortality in black women somewhat differed from that of white women. In contrast to an increased risk of death among overweight white women reported in the large pooled analysis [3], our study as well as other studies [8], [9], [10], [11] except for the Black Women’s Healthy Study, did not find that overweight was associated with the total mortality in black women. In addition, BMI for the lowest mortality rate in black women in our study (BMI 25–\<27.5) was higher than that of white women (BMI 22.5–\<25) [3]. Similarly other studies showed that BMI for the lowest mortality rate in black women was higher than that of white women [6], [8], [9], [11]. Another study [23] also found that the optimal BMI threshold for cardiometabolic risk was 3 units of BMI higher in black women than in white women, but no difference was found between black men and white men. Furthermore, studies with direct measures of body fat reported that black women had smaller amount of visceral adipose tissue for a given BMI than white women [24], [25]. This racial difference in the amount of body fat may partially explain the lack of association between overweight and total mortality in black women in our and other studies. Future studies are needed to investigate whether the different results between black women and white women are due to biologic differences or to methodologic limitations. As to the importance of where fat is stored and your inability to understand why that matters … I don’t know how to explain it much better. The same BMI, the same body fat percentage, has much different health implications depending on where the fat is. ---
**Author:** ![brazil84](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/8491ac/32.png) [@brazil84](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brazil84)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2012, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819/20 "2012-12-22T22:03:12Z")
> [@DSeid](#): > > I cannot speak to what insurance tables, old or recent, are based off of; I can speak to what the medical literature actually has found. Ok, so you believe that the insurance companies are WRONG to have a higher weight cutoff for men for the preferred risk category. Right? > [@](#): > > As to the importance of where fat is stored and your inability to understand why that matters … What exactly do I not understand? > [@](#): > > I don’t know how to explain it much better. The same BMI, the same body fat percentage, has much different health implications depending on where the fat is. Assuming that’s true (and I have no reason to doubt you), so what? How does that contradict my point? [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/unisex-definitions-of-overweight-and-obese/644819.md?page=2)