It may seem like common sense, but a new study supports what most people already suspected.
A European study suggests that people with belly fat -- even if they're at a healthy weight -- have a higher risk of dying during a 10-year period than their same-weight peers without a spare tire. The report was published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine.
"I was surprised that even people who would be considered normal weight in terms of their [body mass index] have a higher risk of death if their waist circumference is increased," says Tobias Pischon, M.D., the study's lead author and a member of the department of epidemiology at the German Institute of Human Nutrition.
According to CNN:
"In one of the largest long-term prospective studies in the world, a team of researchers at the European Prospective Investigation Into Cancer and Nutrition analyzed 359,387 people ages 25 to 70 from nine European countries.
The researchers found that those with a higher body mass index (BMI) were at a greater risk of dying during the 10-year study than normal-weight people. Health.com: Compare more than 40 diet plans
But when they looked at waist circumference and waist-to-hip ratio alone -- not just overall weight -- they found that those factors were strongly associated with a higher mortality risk too. A 2-inch increase in waist circumference raised the mortality risk by 17% in men and 13% in women, regardless of BMI. The link was strongest in those who were at a healthy weight, compared to their heavier peers."
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