Waist Circumference Risks

Larger waists may be linked to greater risk of death among older adults.
The AP (8/10) reports that, according to an American Cancer Institute-funded study published in August 9/23 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine, "belly bulge can be deadly for older adults, even those who aren't overweight or obese by other measures." In fact, the study "suggests men and women with the biggest waistlines have twice the risk of dying over a decade compared to those with the smallest tummies. Surprisingly, bigger waists carry a greater risk of death even for people whose weight is 'normal' by the body mass index, or BMI, a standard measure based on weight and height."
The study found that "men who had a waist size of 47 inches (120 centimeters) or higher and women with waists of 43 inches or larger had about twice the risk of dying over the nine-year study period than those with the smallest waist size of about 35 inches in men and 30 inches in women," Bloomberg News (8/10, Ostrow) reports. "Larger middles have been linked in previous studies to higher death rates, as well as to diabetes, heart disease and high cholesterol, the authors wrote."
The Los Angeles Times (8/9, Stein) "Booster Shots" blog reported, "Researchers from the Epidemiology Research Program of the American Cancer Society in Atlanta looked at data among 48,500 men and 56,343 women ages 50 and older who were mostly white and took part in the Cancer Prevention Study II Nutrition Cohort," following participants "until 2006, at which point 9,315 men and 5,332 women had died." The investigators "also found that men and women with the largest waist circumferences also tended to be less educated, have a high BMI, were physically inactive, used to smoke and had a history of cardiovascular or respiratory disease or cancer."
The Time (8/9, O'Callaghan) "Wellness" blog reported, "Though it's still not totally clear why fat around the gut should be more dangerous than fat distributed anywhere else on the body, it seems that some fat-cell-produced hormones can promote insulin resistance (leading to diabetes), and may throw off the body's hormonal balance in other ways, as well."