(14 Jan 2025)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
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ASSOCIATED PRESS
Chicago – 9 January 2025
1. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Robert Kushner, Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine:
"We’ve become more aware over the past years and decades on the limitations of BMI, which is what we’ve relied on for 20, 30, 40 years, the insurance company even further back. We know the limitations right? Doesn’t measure body fat, body composition, body fat distribution, and most importantly, does not identify the health of the individuals."
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2. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Robert Kushner, Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine:
"Yes, so that the new term of clinical obesity is when someone has excess body fat by their BMI and another measurement of body size along with a symptom or sign that’s impairing their health or their reduced quality of life."
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3. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Robert Kushner, Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine:
"The main takeaways is to get away from solely using body mass index to diagnose obesity, to add another measurement of body size, which more directly assesses body fat. And once we have that identification, then separating out individuals who are leading a good life with good quality of life, no impairment of their health, that would be preclinical obesity. But if their health is impaired or they have reduced quality of life, they transition up to clinical obesity."
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4. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Robert Kushner, Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine:
"We’re hoping to change discussion and awareness that BMI is insufficient to diagnose obesity and to get help for those who have clinical obesity earlier and to monitor those that do not have clinical obesity for the risk of additional problems over time."
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ASSOCIATED PRESS
Seattle – 10 January 2025
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. David Cummings, University of Washington:
"We are currently involved in studies to determine whether the numbers of people classified as having obesity will go up or down with this new system. And we don’t yet know. But to the best of our estimate, based on preliminary data, the overall numbers won’t change dramatically. However, there will be better numbers with a more accurate reflection of who classifies as having obesity for good reasons medically, i.e. being sick because of having too much fat and who doesn’t qualify for obesity."
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6. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. David Cummings, University of Washington:
"So the commission proposes to change the definition of obesity from simply being relatively heavy for your height to being ill because of having too much fat."
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7. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. David Cummings, University of Washington:
"Everybody has known for a long time that BMI was flawed, but people couldn’t figure out a way to replace it. We have gone to the mat and rolled up our sleeves in the effort to come up with that replacement."
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STORYLINE:
A group of global experts is proposing a new way to define and diagnose obesity, reducing the emphasis on the controversial body mass index and hoping to better identify people who need treatment for the disease caused by excess body fat.
Under recommendations released Tuesday night, obesity would no longer be defined by solely by BMI, a calculation of height and weight, but combined with other measurements, such as waist circumference, plus evidence of health problems tied to extra pounds.
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