How to calculate body obesity index?

Obesity can have a great impact on a person's health and body shape, so if you want to understand your body shape, you can calculate the body obesity index. If the index is greater than 24, it is overweight, and greater than 28 is obese.

1. When is a person considered obese? Although the World Health Organization has set standards for obesity, these standards are based on research data from Western populations and are not suitable for Asian populations. Professor Zhou Beifan from the Epidemiology Research Office of the Fuwai Cardiovascular Hospital of the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences wrote in the recently published A7 issue of Popular Medicine that the Chinese Obesity Working Group proposed for the first time an obesity standard suitable for Chinese adults based on a summary analysis report on relevant data of the Chinese population in the 1990s:

2. A body mass index greater than or equal to 24 is overweight, and greater than or equal to 28 is obese; a waist circumference greater than or equal to 85 cm for men and greater than or equal to 80 cm for women are the standards for waist obesity.

3. The body mass index (BMI) is used internationally to measure obesity. Body mass index is equal to weight in kilograms divided by height in meters squared. Waist circumference is an important indicator for measuring abdominal obesity, which reflects the degree of abdominal fat accumulation, and the accumulation of abdominal fat is related to a series of metabolic abnormalities.

4. This summary analysis report of the China Obesity Working Group shows that as the body mass index increases, the incidence of coronary heart disease and stroke will also increase. Overweight and obesity are independent risk factors for coronary heart disease and stroke. For every 2 increases in body mass index, the relative risks of coronary heart disease, stroke, and ischemic stroke increased by 15.4%, 6.1%, and 18.8%, respectively. Once the body mass index reaches or exceeds 24, the probability of developing serious health-threatening diseases such as hypertension, diabetes, coronary heart disease and dyslipidemia will increase significantly.

5. For different races, the same BMI may represent different levels of obesity. The BMI level in Asia, including China, is generally lower than that in European countries. However, many studies have shown that Asians are already at high risk of cardiovascular disease at lower BMI levels. That is to say, when the BMI of Chinese people is lower than 25, the risk of developing high blood pressure begins to increase.