Fat cannot be fit?  Hu says?

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Recently we have read about the obesity study out of Harvard which concluded that even if a person is physically fit, that does not cut risks if he or she is fat.  This was a "data dredge" study taken from existent data (in the infamous nurse's study). Studies using this same generalized data have been proven misleading in several other areas (example HRT) sometimes "proving" the opposite of what double blind studies found.  If you want to "cook the books" a data dredge study is the best way to do so.

The main problems with this study were:

  • Risks were calculated on what the women weighed in 1976 - most obese women are yo yo dieters or weight cycling which has been proven in MANY STUDIES to considerably raise the risk of disease and death, yet yo yo dieting was not taken in consideration AT ALL in the study
  • The researchers are hoping that the public is not familiar with calculating risk factors - a risk factor of less than 2 is considered insignificant.  In the study the risk factor for all those whose BMI was under 40 was 1.69 or less i.e. NOT SIGNIFICANT.  For those with BMI over 40, the risk factor was 2 - slightly higher risk.  This was only 170 women out of 11,000 so the conclusions of the study were decided on 170 women NOT the 11,000 the researchers reported on.

Other and detailed problems with the study include:

  • self reported data on exercise habits - can be very inaccurate
  • if someone exercised 3 times a week or more, they were assumed "fit"
    • fitness can only truly be ascertained by physical exam, treadmill test, O-2 test etc
  • exercise habits only surveyed 5 times in 20 years
    • people are not consistent with exercise programs so the persistence of those who reported exercising is probably a low percentage (only 25 percent of the population exercises CONSISTENTLY)
  • Obesity judged SOLELY by the recorded weight in 1976
    • obese individuals likely attempted to lose weight several times during the 20 years of the study - thus greatly increasing their risk factors over if they remained at the same weight
    • 2 studies of women over 50 showed that those who remained at the same weight had half the risk of heart attack as those losing even a modest amount of weight (even if done sensibly) and even if those women who remained the same were obese to begin with.
  • At least two of the researchers on this study were affiliated with the diet industry or pharmaceutical corporations producing diet pills
    • Willett has been on the payroll of the Atkins Corporation which has paid millions for him to prove their low carb diet is "safe"
    • JoAnn Manson was a consultant for the manufacturer of Redux, a drug about which she admitted, in 1995,  did cause pulmonary hypotension but was only a "slight risk"
The best article on this study was written by a medical provider, Sandy Szwarc, RN, BSN in her latest article, NONSENSE FOR THE DIET SEASON:

http://www.techcentralstation.com/012605E.html

Stephen Milloy, Fox News junk science journalist, had some interesting things to write about this study when it first came out, proving that even a lay person applying a bit of logic would see serious problems with the study!

Milloy wrote:

>>>>> I don’t know whether fat-but-fit is a myth, but I do know that Hu’s study is extraordinarily dubious.

Data on the women’s level of physical activity were collected at numerous points during the study (in 1980, 1982, 1988, 1992, 1996 and 1998). In contrast, the data on the women’s bodyweight were collected only once — by self-report in 1976.

So Hu’s results are based on analyses of the women’s bodyweights in 1976 and their subsequent physical activity levels as much as 22 years later. Hu's myth-busting effort might have been on firmer ground had he showed, for example, that women who were consistently overweight but active throughout 1976-1998 had greater mortality than women who were consistently lean-and-fit throughout that time frame.

Hu claims that the 1976 bodyweight data alone were used “to reduce the effects of underlying disease on weight” — whatever that means. He, therefore, admits possession of the bodyweight data for the period 1976-1998.

I can only conclude that Hu chose to use the 1976 data alone because they gave him the myth-busting, headline-making answer he wanted.

If you think I’ve been too rough on Hu’s fat-but-fit hooey, please recall his recent dastardly effort to link soft drink consumption with diabetes.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,130263,00.html

Hu and crew are notorious purveyors of junk science.

Steven Milloy is the publisher of JunkScience.com, an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute and the author of "Junk Science Judo: Self-Defense Against Health Scares and Scams" (Cato Institute, 2001).<<<<