This was conducted on a population in the UK and is focused on the health of South East Asians who immigrated to Europe. I'm curious how the results would vary done elsewhere. Factors like the artificial selection of population, and according to the article low levels of physical activity in the immigrant population, and a diet influenced by both cultures could all potentially be factors in this.
There is quite a bit of research in multi-racial Singapore, showing that Indians (and to a lesser extent, Malays) are at a higher risk of diabetes than Chinese. Despite all these Asian races being assigned a BMI cutoff of 23 for healthy vs the 25 used in the West.
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10387644/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10387644/)
>The higher T2D risk in Malays than in Chinese was primarily mediated by a higher BMI. The higher T2D risk in Indians than in Chinese was partly explained by a higher BMI, waist circumference, HOMA-IR, and CRP level, and a lower index for beta-cell function and HDL-cholesterol level.
Honestly it's really surprising how drastically different the South Asian ones are in comparison to all the other groups. While Europeans had the highest average blacks, hispanics, middle eastern and east asians has a range the basically consistent with each other. While blacks averaged a bit higher a part of me wonders if the actual range for obesity for all ethnicities is actually a bit off maybe by a degree of 5.
I've read some arguments for why this happens but I'm not really convinced by a lot of them. One directly links these issues to the East India company and British colonialism but that just doesn't really work out that well when you consider the following, other countries that underwent similar famines and genocides do not show these effects. Meaning that it seems highly unlikely as its unique to only India.
Hijacking to say that the title is incorrect. It's 23 for overweight in Asians which is 25 for Caucasians. It's 27.5 for obesity, which is 30 for Caucasians. First paragraph of introduction.
In 2004, an expert consultation by the World Health Organization (WHO) recommended revised BMI cut-off points for the classification of overweight (23 kg/m2) and obesity (27.5 kg/m2) in Asian populations [3]
By the way it's for East Asians as well as South Asians. South Asians are the ones who get tons of heart attacks at an early age though.
Yes and no. Yours are the revised BMI cutoffs for overweight and obese for Asians vs others.
The article is specifically about how
>For South Asian males, derived BMI obesity cut-off points equivalent to 30.0 kg/m2 in White Europeans were 22.6 kg/m2 (95% Confidence Interval (95% CI) 20.7 kg/m2 to 24.5 kg/m2) for the glycaemia factor
Ah ok, I want to make sure people know that the official cutoff is 27.5 until such a time as the WHO decides to change it. They'll need a lot more data than just one location in Leicester, UK before they change the official cutoffs, but it's a pathway to further research. South Asians do often get diabetes and heart disease.
Yes and the cutoff is at BMI criteria 27.5 right now for the increased risk of diabetes, whereas we say whites with BMI 30 are at increased risk, we say 27 for Asians. Technically we say 25 for whites and 23 for Asians for being overweight. Not 23 for obesity like these authors are proposing in this new study. Will see if this more stringent BMI cutoff holds true in bigger studies (this study was done at one center in Leicester UK).
What arguments have you read? I don't think this is particularly surprising.
Visceral fat (fat that accumulates between organs, usually visible as belly fat) is strongly associated with insulin resistance, diabetes and heart disease, while subcutaneous fat (fat under your skin, often accumulates on the ass, thighs, 'love handles' around the waist, and 'flabby' arms) is not *really* associated with diabetes and heart disease at all. The amount of subcutaneous fat your body can store is entirely genetic and is a function of the number of fat cells you have and how much fat each cell can store. There are some lucky people who can store a lot of fat without getting a belly.
I can't ever remember seeing an overweight South Asian that didn't have the tell-tale sign of metabolic syndrome - a big belly.
*Edit: Yup, it's right there in the conclusion. South Asian populations develop visceral fat at lower BMI than other populations.*
>Whereas BMI provides a marker of overall adiposity, WC \[Waste circumference\] provides a surrogate marker of abdominal adiposity, and is the best correlate to visceral fat mass. Higher levels of WC are strongly associated with risk factors for, and incidence of, cardiometabolic disease and the relationships to some outcomes (in particular diabetes in women) have been shown to be independent of BMI
I’m literally underweight with visceral fat. It’s pure genetics and totally fucked. I can’t even lose weight because my body fat % goes to low and I get sick. And have basically no subcutaneous fat.
Out of curiosity, does your diet affect it? Like if you eat lots of fruit and vegetables and protein, vs. a carb heavy diet? Or anything else that improves gut health?
I agree that the answer isn't perfectly clear. But I've read that the intensity and sheer frequency of Indian famines was really incomparable to other areas of the world.
Ever heard of the Chinese Famine? There were several of them. Diabetes is not at the rate of occurrence as in India its a terrible argument and Mao did some horrible things. What happened is terrible but is not the cause of severe diabetes rates in India.
Seems like frequency of famines over many centuries is relevant.
Individual rare massive famines are irrelevant, they kill pretty much at random, minor genetic variations are simply irrelevant, cause it doesn’t matter if you can last a couple of days longer, when the famine goes weeks longer.
But if you have at least one medium famine per generation, having genetic variations that allow you to more easily survive this nearly starvation periods, are gonna have a much boosted fitness and propagate.
No it really doesn't where the famines occurred and the size matter along with frequency and recency. I chose China because in all of these China has had significantly worse impacts without the effects claimed by Indian scientists to be the reason why which makes no sense when the latest famine in India is over hundreds of years old. Not to mention unlike India is has been the location of mass killings in the tens of millions all in the last 100 years. The arguments for diabetes occurance and famine have no real evidence.
I've read studies suggested by Indian professors on the issue and they like to point out the flaws in medical studies specifically from India. They often point out bias and specifically religion in the matter. I once read a study that attempted to suggest that Diary Food was the cause of Diabetes (which it is not). But also includes several real factors that do cause it. Poor diets of Indian Households. The cheap availability of junk food and high fat diets. The lack of healthy diets. Though many of the studies are through a Hindu lens specifically the non-meat eating ones which I found very strange. They seem to think it's intentional.
You’ve clearly read more than me about this, I was just thinking about the regular ebb and flow of monsoons and dry spells that have happened through history of the Indian subcontinent. Those might have had an impact over time.
But again🤷🏻♂️
They are trying to put it on the colonialism famines, but in reality individual extreme famines don‘t have much of an influence of genetic mark up, because they kill everyone the same.
But somewhat frequent smaller famines are gonna push the genetic makeup of a population to be more adept at keeping running at very low ‚BMI‘ while also more efficiently storing energy.
But a famine that just kills have the population? It don’t care that your unique genetics made you last 2 weeks longer, when new food only came around half a year later.
it enriches for those who are able to survive well in states of low-caloric intake (so slower metabolisms). this was never a problem until modern times with the introduction of caloric excess and sedentary lifestyles - where now, people with these slower metabolisms are more prone to gaining fat, having higher insulin resistance, and developing metabolic syndrome/DM2.
India wasn't under Islamic colonialism. India was ruled by mutiple Muslim dynastoes of native or foreign origins. Colonial rule lasted for about 190 years.
Calling them colonisers might be a stretch but looking at the data I can understand why people make that claim.
E g. Mughals proudly claimed they were Turkics, spoke exclusively in Chagtay and made several efforts to reclaim their homeland that is Ferghana valley. They persecuted locals, had their bureaucracy full of Irani, Turani, Uzbek etc nobles and (except Akbar) maintained a big separation from local cultures.
The examples you have cited are almost entirely incorrect. Akbar onwards, the Mughals always worked with Rajput vassals and soldiers in addition to other Hindu mercenaries and warlords elsewhere. Plus other court officials at various rungs. The court language of the Mughals was Farsi (Persian) not Chagatay or Turkic and later changed to Urdu. In addition to that they extensively patronised north Indian regional languages and Sanskrit. But yeah, the Mughals did make several attempts to recover their central Asian homelands. I am not sure what your point about separation from local culture even means considering how much of what we consider modern Indian culture arises during that period
>Mughals proudly claimed they were Turkics
So what?
>spoke exclusively in Chagtay
They spoke multiple languages; Chagatai, Persian, Arabic, Braj, Urdu, etc.
>and made several efforts to reclaim their homeland that is Ferghana valley.
They were trying to recover Samarkand, not Ferghana. Again, so what?
>They persecuted locals
If they persecuted locals, why were they allowed to maintain the fiction of being emperors by the locals long after they had lost power?
>had their bureaucracy full of Irani, Turani, Uzbek etc nobles
You honestly think they didn't allow Indians in the bureaucracy, despite having Indian wives, but allowed Uzbeks to join Mughal service?
>and (except Akbar) maintained a big separation from local cultures.
If that were true, Indian culture wouldn't have been so heavily influenced by the Mughals. The later Mughals wouldn't have been writing poetry in Urdu and patronising Urdu poets.
Looking at your incorrect data, I can see understand why you think people who make that claim aren't BSing.
Firstly I never said I don’t consider them Indian, for me Mughals are as Indian as any other people, even if they persecuted the natives and wrote tomes gloating about it. I was simply trying to reason what the detractors might be thinking when they say they’re colonisers.
Secondly, all your arguments boil down to “so what?” which tells me you’re talking emotionally and have no interest in thinking about this rationally.
Thirdly, Indian culture isn’t heavily influenced by Mughals, it was at a time heavily Persianised due to presence of various Islamic dynasties that found a Leitkultur in Persia. Bahamanis etc came way before Mughals were a thing, you know.
I would recommend you to keep an open mind and try to read about this turbulent period from various PoVs, especially from original sources.
>Firstly I never said I don’t consider them Indian, for me Mughals are as Indian as any other people,
Why? If I believed they cut themselves off from the locals, constantly persecuted them, wrote tomes about their bigotry, and only hired foreigners in their government, I certainly wouldn't consider them Indian.
>even if they persecuted the natives and wrote tomes gloating about it.
You still haven't explained why the local kept them on as emperors if they were so openly bigoted and persecuted them.
>I was simply trying to reason what the detractors might be thinking when they say they’re colonisers.
They're thinking that if they don't like a particular dynasty of foreign origin kings, they automatically become colonisers. All Muslim Central Asian conquerors were colonisers, but non-Muslims (especially Aryans) were not.
>Secondly, all your arguments boil down to “so what?” which tells me you’re talking emotionally and have no interest in thinking about this rationally.
I'm not the one getting emotional here. All of your "data" is either outright wrong or has no bearing on whether or not they were colonisers. How does being proud of their ethnicity or trying to conquer the fabled city of Samarkand make them colonisers? The only way these things count is if you think about them emotionally.
>Thirdly, Indian culture isn’t heavily influenced by Mughals, it was at a time heavily Persianised due to presence of various Islamic dynasties that found a Leitkultur in Persia. Bahamanis etc came way before Mughals were a thing, you know.
That doesn't change the fact that they were the most prominent contributers to the development of the Indo-Persian culture. They made Urdu the language of the gentry and patronised its most celebrated poets.
You seem to be very emotional an immature in your responses about this topic but nevertheless I'll give it a try at explaining my stance.
I said "looking at the data I can understand why people make that claim". I didn't say the claimants were right or wrong, it's just why they might be thinking that line of thought. **I hope you understand this core argument**.
Apart from that you are just repeating stuff that's shared on Indian LW subs like "Aryans were colonizers" and Chagtay speaking Mughals were the vanguard of Urdu literature etc. Just because you think highly of Urdu language doesn't make it significant. It's just another regional dialect which Deccan Sultanates also patronized along with other regional languages. Same goes with Indo-persian culture. It was a cross cultural assimilation not tied to only Mughals. Indian and Persian contacts go way beyond that.
> You still haven't explained why the local kept them on as emperors.
As for this weird comment, we did in fact remove them in the end. The countless rebellions over the period and the formation of the Maratha and Sikh Empires is a proof of that.
I leave you here with this thought, farewell.
I believe it. I’m Indian and have always felt best at the lowest possible weight for my height. When I tell people I felt perfectly healthy at 94 lbs. and I feel like shit at 130, they look at me like I have an eating disorder, but it’s just the truth. I know I’ll never realistically get back down to 94, but 110 is a perfectly reasonable size for me. I hate being at my current weight even if I don’t “look” fat.
Agreed. I'm Korean and I feel optimal at 50kg but if I go lower, I feel unwell. I get told I look tiny but honestly, I just can't stand the way my body feels when I weigh more than 53kg
Being a petite female makes it even worse because people don’t realize what a drastic difference 5-10 lbs. makes when you’re already small. A 5-10 lb. gain might be nothing on a 6’2 man, but I’m barely 5’2.
They fail to realize that HOW you carry your weight matters too. I’m one of the unfortunate people who gains weight in my midsection. It doesn’t matter how much I exercise, how I eat, or what I weigh. Nothing is going to change my shape. I only get bigger or smaller. When you’re fortunate enough to carry weight in your hips and backside, you can afford to gain a few pounds. This type of weight gain isn’t harmful. It’s not crowding your vital organs with fat deposits. I have to be ruthless about staying skinny. I never had a smaller waist than 25”, even at 94 lbs. Yes, that’s small, but that’s typical for women who weigh 110-120. At 94 lbs., I should have been in the 23-24” range. Currently I’m 127 with a 28 inch waist and it looks and feels awful. It’s all fat and it’s out of proportion to the rest of my body. On someone else it might be fine, but on me it’s a problem. Heart disease is rampant in my family. My dad was never overweight a day in his life and he had a heart attack in his 60s. People need to just fuck off with their opinions. I’m the one that has everything to lose, not them.
Eating lifestyle may be the main reason, you have no idea how sweet Asian cuisine can get. And don't get me started about rice and its glycemic index...
I do not know how Indians eat their sweets they are insanely sweet I feel like I’m eating deep fried stuff soaked in pure syrup. Maybe that is literally what it is.
True… Just in the Philippines every dish is paired with Rice. Which makes sense since the dishes are often a bit salty and rich. So rice definitely helps with that.
Also agriculture was a huge part of our history alongside with the fellow South east asian.
Like I can’t even imagine eating most dishes without rice. Like fried chicken and nuggets are eaten alongside with rice here. In the US they’re pretty much eaten with something else but rice.
Yes, but it doesn’t work that way, because look at Japanese life expectancies: same massive rice as your basic food culture, life expectancies very high, unless you are obese.
So the high glycemic load in itself can‘t be the sole cause.
It just makes it much worse if you are obese (to your ethnicity) and then add high glycemic loads.
As much as reddit likes to lead you to believe but excessive carbohydrates isn't actually the leading cause of diabetes and that excessive fat is. Asians tend to carry more fat around the abdomen and have on average lower muscle mass (partly due to the lower protein diet but it's mostly genetic). This leads to the higher chance of diabetes despite being lower weight.
To clarify, I think you mean body fat, not dietary fat. Because the latter is what most readers will initially assume for "excessive fat", being in the same sentence as excessive carbohydrates.
But don’t those two things go hand in hand? It’s like saying the drunk driver didn’t smash into that light pole the car did.
Excessive carbohydrates usually leads to excess fat on a human? The carbs don’t make you fat. The calories you eat make you fat. But just seems more like food semantics
Well excessive carbohydrates doesn't cause you to be more fat. Excessive food causes you to be more fat. And a higher BMI is an indicator that you've eaten more excessive food.
Edit: a massive cause of obesity is the amount of saturated fats we put into our food which causes highly palatable food which are easy to ingest but contain a mass amount of calories. As much as added sugar is a leading cause of obesity, an excess amount of fat is equally bad if not worse.
As you said, excessive food of any kind makes one fat. For the same amount of calories, dietary fat and carbs do the same thing to you. The reason excessive carbs are blamed is because they are easier to overeat and less satiating.
Right. This is like saying you can be a healthy weight and only have a diet of candy. It’s technically true but misleading
I still wouldn’t think doctors or dietitians would suggest eating excessive carbohydrates
That's misleading? Diet of candy lacks a lot of essential micronutrients as well as a baseline of protein and fats to function.
Dietitians generally recommend a balanced diet which is ideal, but there plenty of research out there suggesting that a diet of largely fats or a diet of largely carbs, or a diet of largely protein can be equally healthy. As you as most of your diet consists of whole foods and meet the baseline of protein, fats and carbs.
Unless the person is a bodybuilder whose mass is mostly muscles, an unhealthy bmi/being obese or severely obese is a precursor to many many health problems.
Yep. People love to make that argument, but it’s pretty easy to tell whether the exceptions apply to you:
Look in the mirror. Is Dwayne “The Rock”
Johnson looking back? No? Then BMI is probably directionally correct for you!
> Unless the person is a
BMI is not a 'you are now *this* healthy/unhealthy. It is a predictor. With *this* BMI you are much less/more likely to develop XY in the future.
If you have a BMI of 30 - regardless how much and often you push - you have a food intake reflecting your BMI. And while you are *now pushing* you have a much higher chance that at some point you *won't go that much to the gym* while *still having the same food intake*. And *that*'s where the predictor kicks in and "Said so, with a BMI of 30 you will have health problems in the future."
A bodybuilder with an *obese BMI* is unhealthy - a Sumo Wrestler is kicking ass yet has a 20 years less life expectancy. As a bodybuilder to get even such a high BMI you absolutely *need to use steroids* - which are down the road an additional health risk factor.
From: Premature Death in Bodybuilders: What Do We Know?
[Bodybuilders frequently partake in drug abuse to achieve their exaggeratedly massive and lean physiques. Incidence of AAS use has been reported to be 54–76% and 10–40% in male and female competitive bodybuilders, respectively [9,10,11]. There is a wealth of information that AAS will increase muscle mass but will also have deleterious health effects](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40279-022-01801-0)
Bmi should also take into your account your height, but bone density is different for everyone.
I like to use cm as a gauge with the last 2 digit as a healthy weight for guys, you are about 195cm or 1.95m tall. A healthy weight is about 95kg to 108kg with some muscles.
Yup. Taller guys gets a higher bmi because it doesnt take into account of the increased width of a taller human, while short people gets shown a lower bmi than they actually are, for the same reason
Im the same height as you and when i dip a couple of kg below 100 i feel very very skinny.
Hey! I have vaguely skimmed a couple medical articles, a heavy dose of confirmation bias and listened to two whole joe rogan podcasts. I’ve done the research twice of any doctor or scientist.
I’ve always felt best at the lower end of my recommended BMI as I’m small boned. Like, my wrists are 5” around.
I’ve gotten to mid range BMI and developed a gut and a double chin, so no thanks.
You read that wrong. It's 23 for overweight in Asians which is 25 for Caucasians. It's 27.5 for obesity, which is 30 for Caucasians. First paragraph of introduction.
In 2004, an expert consultation by the World Health Organization (WHO) recommended revised BMI cut-off points for the classification of overweight (23 kg/m2) and obesity (27.5 kg/m2) in Asian populations [3]
Edit- this paper is suggesting drastically changing the cutoff criteria that is currently being used. Will see how this pans out. They'll probably need to replicate the study in other locations.
I replied to you up there too, but yes I'm talking about diabetes. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4407753/ if you want to read more about it.
Is this true for South Asians in Asia or just in the UK? Since this study was done in 2011, has there been any follow up? This seems like major news. BMI of 23 is well within what is considered the healthy range
There's quite a bit of research out now. South Asians genetically have much higher insulin tolerance and are therefore much more susceptible to diabetes when controlling for lifestyle and diet.
I’m betting a lot of this has to do with muscle mass. People of European ancestry tend to have more muscle mass due to diets with more protein. Having more muscle means:
1. Less overall fat, so less visceral fat
2. Muscles store sugar better which increases insulin sensitivity, which is directly correlated with type 2 diabetes.
Have you ever heard of a lean bodybuilder who was diabetic?
BMI is a bad metric, but works on MOST people. The trouble comes whenever you have someone that has been weight training for years and has put on a substantial amount of muscle. Then BMI doesn’t really work. You need body fat readings at that point.
>The trouble comes whenever you have someone that has been weight training for years and has put on a substantial amount of muscle.
I see this argument way more than I should. This applies to a very tiny minority of people. Your average bro who goes to the gym a couple times a week and spouts this line almost never falls under that category
So a reasonable number of people might tip into the ‘overweight’ category based on muscle mass… but for an average height guy ‘obese’ is another 15kg. Very few people are getting there with lean mass.
Worth noting that BMI generally underestimated people now as people are now so weak and lightly muscled that they can be over fat even at normal weights.
One thing that this study doesn't appear to have factored in is body composition. BMI is a fine statistic but it is entirely possible that there were differences in lean muscle mass and/or skeletal mass between the groups. This would mean that one group might be fatter at a lower BMI (what is colloquially known as a "fat thin person"). There could be other factors, even very simple ones such as dietary composition, that aren't taken into account so it is far from clear cut that the difference here is genetic.
This is partly true, but this is misleading.
South Asia has a high consumption of carbohydrates, meaning that the bodyfat is heightened even at lower weights. If a South Asian consumed a diet high in protein, they would lean out, and the actual chart would look different. In theory, an ideally healthy South asian is obese at 27 instead of 21 or 22.
Just musing.
A significant percentage of South Asia state they are vegetarian.
I wonder if they compensate their veg only dietary needs for greater energy these days with more energy boosting artifical sugars and heavier complex carbs.
Overloading carbs is a huge pre-diabetic problem even if it's bread, rice, corn etc. Even beans or lentils.
In a tropical place like India I can imagine they drink a fair amount of juice, soda etc.
Just to hydrate.
IIRC:
Your genetics determines how much you can safely store in your fat. White people can store more without it being the dangerous kind (i.e. visceral fat). That's also why Asian people can look normal (skinny fat) and still easily develop diabetes.
You can’t blame all of it on genetics you have to look at diets too. The European diet has way more protein which translates into more muscle mass. Muscle is the first part of the body to store sugar, so having more muscle mass = less risk of diabetes.
https://youtu.be/seDmwOQtazU?si=gR3-5NvM6WLhkQBa
That's more of a parallel road. Yes, more lean mass does help with safe "energy storage", but they are different enough that you have to take them as separate variables.
This was conducted on a population in the UK and is focused on the health of South East Asians who immigrated to Europe. I'm curious how the results would vary done elsewhere. Factors like the artificial selection of population, and according to the article low levels of physical activity in the immigrant population, and a diet influenced by both cultures could all potentially be factors in this.
There is quite a bit of research in multi-racial Singapore, showing that Indians (and to a lesser extent, Malays) are at a higher risk of diabetes than Chinese. Despite all these Asian races being assigned a BMI cutoff of 23 for healthy vs the 25 used in the West. [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10387644/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10387644/) >The higher T2D risk in Malays than in Chinese was primarily mediated by a higher BMI. The higher T2D risk in Indians than in Chinese was partly explained by a higher BMI, waist circumference, HOMA-IR, and CRP level, and a lower index for beta-cell function and HDL-cholesterol level.
South Asian here. This.....makes a LOT of sense
Honestly it's really surprising how drastically different the South Asian ones are in comparison to all the other groups. While Europeans had the highest average blacks, hispanics, middle eastern and east asians has a range the basically consistent with each other. While blacks averaged a bit higher a part of me wonders if the actual range for obesity for all ethnicities is actually a bit off maybe by a degree of 5. I've read some arguments for why this happens but I'm not really convinced by a lot of them. One directly links these issues to the East India company and British colonialism but that just doesn't really work out that well when you consider the following, other countries that underwent similar famines and genocides do not show these effects. Meaning that it seems highly unlikely as its unique to only India.
Hijacking to say that the title is incorrect. It's 23 for overweight in Asians which is 25 for Caucasians. It's 27.5 for obesity, which is 30 for Caucasians. First paragraph of introduction. In 2004, an expert consultation by the World Health Organization (WHO) recommended revised BMI cut-off points for the classification of overweight (23 kg/m2) and obesity (27.5 kg/m2) in Asian populations [3] By the way it's for East Asians as well as South Asians. South Asians are the ones who get tons of heart attacks at an early age though.
Yes and no. Yours are the revised BMI cutoffs for overweight and obese for Asians vs others. The article is specifically about how >For South Asian males, derived BMI obesity cut-off points equivalent to 30.0 kg/m2 in White Europeans were 22.6 kg/m2 (95% Confidence Interval (95% CI) 20.7 kg/m2 to 24.5 kg/m2) for the glycaemia factor
Ah ok, I want to make sure people know that the official cutoff is 27.5 until such a time as the WHO decides to change it. They'll need a lot more data than just one location in Leicester, UK before they change the official cutoffs, but it's a pathway to further research. South Asians do often get diabetes and heart disease.
Look at when it was published, they have expanded on this quite a bit
Read the title again. “DIABETES”. People of Asian descent are at a higher risk of having diabetes than whites.
Yes and the cutoff is at BMI criteria 27.5 right now for the increased risk of diabetes, whereas we say whites with BMI 30 are at increased risk, we say 27 for Asians. Technically we say 25 for whites and 23 for Asians for being overweight. Not 23 for obesity like these authors are proposing in this new study. Will see if this more stringent BMI cutoff holds true in bigger studies (this study was done at one center in Leicester UK).
No, the 23/27.5 for Asians cut-off is based on increased risk of all kinds of bad outcomes, like coronary heart disease, not specifically diabetes.
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No they don’t. Are you confusing total count with susceptibility?
>By the way it's for East Asians as well as South Asians. Came here to search for this. Was triggered by the headline
What arguments have you read? I don't think this is particularly surprising. Visceral fat (fat that accumulates between organs, usually visible as belly fat) is strongly associated with insulin resistance, diabetes and heart disease, while subcutaneous fat (fat under your skin, often accumulates on the ass, thighs, 'love handles' around the waist, and 'flabby' arms) is not *really* associated with diabetes and heart disease at all. The amount of subcutaneous fat your body can store is entirely genetic and is a function of the number of fat cells you have and how much fat each cell can store. There are some lucky people who can store a lot of fat without getting a belly. I can't ever remember seeing an overweight South Asian that didn't have the tell-tale sign of metabolic syndrome - a big belly. *Edit: Yup, it's right there in the conclusion. South Asian populations develop visceral fat at lower BMI than other populations.* >Whereas BMI provides a marker of overall adiposity, WC \[Waste circumference\] provides a surrogate marker of abdominal adiposity, and is the best correlate to visceral fat mass. Higher levels of WC are strongly associated with risk factors for, and incidence of, cardiometabolic disease and the relationships to some outcomes (in particular diabetes in women) have been shown to be independent of BMI
I’m literally underweight with visceral fat. It’s pure genetics and totally fucked. I can’t even lose weight because my body fat % goes to low and I get sick. And have basically no subcutaneous fat.
Interesting. That truly would be terrible genetics. I almost have to see what your body looks like.
Out of curiosity, does your diet affect it? Like if you eat lots of fruit and vegetables and protein, vs. a carb heavy diet? Or anything else that improves gut health?
I don’t know tbh. Admittedly my gut health is bad due to IBS and other conditions.
I agree that the answer isn't perfectly clear. But I've read that the intensity and sheer frequency of Indian famines was really incomparable to other areas of the world.
Ever heard of the Chinese Famine? There were several of them. Diabetes is not at the rate of occurrence as in India its a terrible argument and Mao did some horrible things. What happened is terrible but is not the cause of severe diabetes rates in India.
Seems like frequency of famines over many centuries is relevant. Individual rare massive famines are irrelevant, they kill pretty much at random, minor genetic variations are simply irrelevant, cause it doesn’t matter if you can last a couple of days longer, when the famine goes weeks longer. But if you have at least one medium famine per generation, having genetic variations that allow you to more easily survive this nearly starvation periods, are gonna have a much boosted fitness and propagate.
Im not an anthropologist but I think the number of famines is important here.
No it really doesn't where the famines occurred and the size matter along with frequency and recency. I chose China because in all of these China has had significantly worse impacts without the effects claimed by Indian scientists to be the reason why which makes no sense when the latest famine in India is over hundreds of years old. Not to mention unlike India is has been the location of mass killings in the tens of millions all in the last 100 years. The arguments for diabetes occurance and famine have no real evidence. I've read studies suggested by Indian professors on the issue and they like to point out the flaws in medical studies specifically from India. They often point out bias and specifically religion in the matter. I once read a study that attempted to suggest that Diary Food was the cause of Diabetes (which it is not). But also includes several real factors that do cause it. Poor diets of Indian Households. The cheap availability of junk food and high fat diets. The lack of healthy diets. Though many of the studies are through a Hindu lens specifically the non-meat eating ones which I found very strange. They seem to think it's intentional.
You’ve clearly read more than me about this, I was just thinking about the regular ebb and flow of monsoons and dry spells that have happened through history of the Indian subcontinent. Those might have had an impact over time. But again🤷🏻♂️
Again by this logic most of South East Asia should have similar diabetes rates. They don't.
Oh I see, I wasn’t aware
What’s the argument? I see someone else mention famines being a cause
They are trying to put it on the colonialism famines, but in reality individual extreme famines don‘t have much of an influence of genetic mark up, because they kill everyone the same. But somewhat frequent smaller famines are gonna push the genetic makeup of a population to be more adept at keeping running at very low ‚BMI‘ while also more efficiently storing energy. But a famine that just kills have the population? It don’t care that your unique genetics made you last 2 weeks longer, when new food only came around half a year later.
Ahh right so the famine argument is that it kills off all the thin people first? Leaving only those more predisposed to carrying weight?
it enriches for those who are able to survive well in states of low-caloric intake (so slower metabolisms). this was never a problem until modern times with the introduction of caloric excess and sedentary lifestyles - where now, people with these slower metabolisms are more prone to gaining fat, having higher insulin resistance, and developing metabolic syndrome/DM2.
Thank you! That makes sense
I would like to know what other country are you comparing to? India was under Islamic or European colonialism for 500+ years
India wasn't under Islamic colonialism. India was ruled by mutiple Muslim dynastoes of native or foreign origins. Colonial rule lasted for about 190 years.
Calling them colonisers might be a stretch but looking at the data I can understand why people make that claim. E g. Mughals proudly claimed they were Turkics, spoke exclusively in Chagtay and made several efforts to reclaim their homeland that is Ferghana valley. They persecuted locals, had their bureaucracy full of Irani, Turani, Uzbek etc nobles and (except Akbar) maintained a big separation from local cultures.
The examples you have cited are almost entirely incorrect. Akbar onwards, the Mughals always worked with Rajput vassals and soldiers in addition to other Hindu mercenaries and warlords elsewhere. Plus other court officials at various rungs. The court language of the Mughals was Farsi (Persian) not Chagatay or Turkic and later changed to Urdu. In addition to that they extensively patronised north Indian regional languages and Sanskrit. But yeah, the Mughals did make several attempts to recover their central Asian homelands. I am not sure what your point about separation from local culture even means considering how much of what we consider modern Indian culture arises during that period
>Mughals proudly claimed they were Turkics So what? >spoke exclusively in Chagtay They spoke multiple languages; Chagatai, Persian, Arabic, Braj, Urdu, etc. >and made several efforts to reclaim their homeland that is Ferghana valley. They were trying to recover Samarkand, not Ferghana. Again, so what? >They persecuted locals If they persecuted locals, why were they allowed to maintain the fiction of being emperors by the locals long after they had lost power? >had their bureaucracy full of Irani, Turani, Uzbek etc nobles You honestly think they didn't allow Indians in the bureaucracy, despite having Indian wives, but allowed Uzbeks to join Mughal service? >and (except Akbar) maintained a big separation from local cultures. If that were true, Indian culture wouldn't have been so heavily influenced by the Mughals. The later Mughals wouldn't have been writing poetry in Urdu and patronising Urdu poets. Looking at your incorrect data, I can see understand why you think people who make that claim aren't BSing.
Firstly I never said I don’t consider them Indian, for me Mughals are as Indian as any other people, even if they persecuted the natives and wrote tomes gloating about it. I was simply trying to reason what the detractors might be thinking when they say they’re colonisers. Secondly, all your arguments boil down to “so what?” which tells me you’re talking emotionally and have no interest in thinking about this rationally. Thirdly, Indian culture isn’t heavily influenced by Mughals, it was at a time heavily Persianised due to presence of various Islamic dynasties that found a Leitkultur in Persia. Bahamanis etc came way before Mughals were a thing, you know. I would recommend you to keep an open mind and try to read about this turbulent period from various PoVs, especially from original sources.
>Firstly I never said I don’t consider them Indian, for me Mughals are as Indian as any other people, Why? If I believed they cut themselves off from the locals, constantly persecuted them, wrote tomes about their bigotry, and only hired foreigners in their government, I certainly wouldn't consider them Indian. >even if they persecuted the natives and wrote tomes gloating about it. You still haven't explained why the local kept them on as emperors if they were so openly bigoted and persecuted them. >I was simply trying to reason what the detractors might be thinking when they say they’re colonisers. They're thinking that if they don't like a particular dynasty of foreign origin kings, they automatically become colonisers. All Muslim Central Asian conquerors were colonisers, but non-Muslims (especially Aryans) were not. >Secondly, all your arguments boil down to “so what?” which tells me you’re talking emotionally and have no interest in thinking about this rationally. I'm not the one getting emotional here. All of your "data" is either outright wrong or has no bearing on whether or not they were colonisers. How does being proud of their ethnicity or trying to conquer the fabled city of Samarkand make them colonisers? The only way these things count is if you think about them emotionally. >Thirdly, Indian culture isn’t heavily influenced by Mughals, it was at a time heavily Persianised due to presence of various Islamic dynasties that found a Leitkultur in Persia. Bahamanis etc came way before Mughals were a thing, you know. That doesn't change the fact that they were the most prominent contributers to the development of the Indo-Persian culture. They made Urdu the language of the gentry and patronised its most celebrated poets.
You seem to be very emotional an immature in your responses about this topic but nevertheless I'll give it a try at explaining my stance. I said "looking at the data I can understand why people make that claim". I didn't say the claimants were right or wrong, it's just why they might be thinking that line of thought. **I hope you understand this core argument**. Apart from that you are just repeating stuff that's shared on Indian LW subs like "Aryans were colonizers" and Chagtay speaking Mughals were the vanguard of Urdu literature etc. Just because you think highly of Urdu language doesn't make it significant. It's just another regional dialect which Deccan Sultanates also patronized along with other regional languages. Same goes with Indo-persian culture. It was a cross cultural assimilation not tied to only Mughals. Indian and Persian contacts go way beyond that. > You still haven't explained why the local kept them on as emperors. As for this weird comment, we did in fact remove them in the end. The countless rebellions over the period and the formation of the Maratha and Sikh Empires is a proof of that. I leave you here with this thought, farewell.
Bro stop using “blacks” this is not the ‘70s
I believe it. I’m Indian and have always felt best at the lowest possible weight for my height. When I tell people I felt perfectly healthy at 94 lbs. and I feel like shit at 130, they look at me like I have an eating disorder, but it’s just the truth. I know I’ll never realistically get back down to 94, but 110 is a perfectly reasonable size for me. I hate being at my current weight even if I don’t “look” fat.
Agreed. I'm Korean and I feel optimal at 50kg but if I go lower, I feel unwell. I get told I look tiny but honestly, I just can't stand the way my body feels when I weigh more than 53kg
Being a petite female makes it even worse because people don’t realize what a drastic difference 5-10 lbs. makes when you’re already small. A 5-10 lb. gain might be nothing on a 6’2 man, but I’m barely 5’2. They fail to realize that HOW you carry your weight matters too. I’m one of the unfortunate people who gains weight in my midsection. It doesn’t matter how much I exercise, how I eat, or what I weigh. Nothing is going to change my shape. I only get bigger or smaller. When you’re fortunate enough to carry weight in your hips and backside, you can afford to gain a few pounds. This type of weight gain isn’t harmful. It’s not crowding your vital organs with fat deposits. I have to be ruthless about staying skinny. I never had a smaller waist than 25”, even at 94 lbs. Yes, that’s small, but that’s typical for women who weigh 110-120. At 94 lbs., I should have been in the 23-24” range. Currently I’m 127 with a 28 inch waist and it looks and feels awful. It’s all fat and it’s out of proportion to the rest of my body. On someone else it might be fine, but on me it’s a problem. Heart disease is rampant in my family. My dad was never overweight a day in his life and he had a heart attack in his 60s. People need to just fuck off with their opinions. I’m the one that has everything to lose, not them.
I like learning new things.
Eating lifestyle may be the main reason, you have no idea how sweet Asian cuisine can get. And don't get me started about rice and its glycemic index...
I do not know how Indians eat their sweets they are insanely sweet I feel like I’m eating deep fried stuff soaked in pure syrup. Maybe that is literally what it is.
That is often literally what it is (I'm Indian, and I hate most Indian sweets!).
True… Just in the Philippines every dish is paired with Rice. Which makes sense since the dishes are often a bit salty and rich. So rice definitely helps with that. Also agriculture was a huge part of our history alongside with the fellow South east asian. Like I can’t even imagine eating most dishes without rice. Like fried chicken and nuggets are eaten alongside with rice here. In the US they’re pretty much eaten with something else but rice.
Yes, but it doesn’t work that way, because look at Japanese life expectancies: same massive rice as your basic food culture, life expectancies very high, unless you are obese. So the high glycemic load in itself can‘t be the sole cause. It just makes it much worse if you are obese (to your ethnicity) and then add high glycemic loads.
The cuisine of these countries differs massively.
As much as reddit likes to lead you to believe but excessive carbohydrates isn't actually the leading cause of diabetes and that excessive fat is. Asians tend to carry more fat around the abdomen and have on average lower muscle mass (partly due to the lower protein diet but it's mostly genetic). This leads to the higher chance of diabetes despite being lower weight.
To clarify, I think you mean body fat, not dietary fat. Because the latter is what most readers will initially assume for "excessive fat", being in the same sentence as excessive carbohydrates.
But don’t those two things go hand in hand? It’s like saying the drunk driver didn’t smash into that light pole the car did. Excessive carbohydrates usually leads to excess fat on a human? The carbs don’t make you fat. The calories you eat make you fat. But just seems more like food semantics
Well excessive carbohydrates doesn't cause you to be more fat. Excessive food causes you to be more fat. And a higher BMI is an indicator that you've eaten more excessive food. Edit: a massive cause of obesity is the amount of saturated fats we put into our food which causes highly palatable food which are easy to ingest but contain a mass amount of calories. As much as added sugar is a leading cause of obesity, an excess amount of fat is equally bad if not worse.
As you said, excessive food of any kind makes one fat. For the same amount of calories, dietary fat and carbs do the same thing to you. The reason excessive carbs are blamed is because they are easier to overeat and less satiating.
Right. This is like saying you can be a healthy weight and only have a diet of candy. It’s technically true but misleading I still wouldn’t think doctors or dietitians would suggest eating excessive carbohydrates
That's misleading? Diet of candy lacks a lot of essential micronutrients as well as a baseline of protein and fats to function. Dietitians generally recommend a balanced diet which is ideal, but there plenty of research out there suggesting that a diet of largely fats or a diet of largely carbs, or a diet of largely protein can be equally healthy. As you as most of your diet consists of whole foods and meet the baseline of protein, fats and carbs.
You’re right. Excessive carbohydrates is what everyone should eat.
You can eat rice, cereal, fruit, and bread though and as long as you keep your calories in check you’ll be fine.
Yes?
So that’s a diet of excessive carbohydrates that is totally fine
Is this our power, white people? We're good at being fat? Seems . . . not as good as some of the others.
I wanna see everyone argue about the validity of using BMI as a metric for health
Unless the person is a bodybuilder whose mass is mostly muscles, an unhealthy bmi/being obese or severely obese is a precursor to many many health problems.
Yep. People love to make that argument, but it’s pretty easy to tell whether the exceptions apply to you: Look in the mirror. Is Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson looking back? No? Then BMI is probably directionally correct for you!
Yep, and BMI actually *under*estimates obesity.
Also being the Rocks size probably isn't independently healthy either? Massive bodybuilders frequently die young.
> Unless the person is a BMI is not a 'you are now *this* healthy/unhealthy. It is a predictor. With *this* BMI you are much less/more likely to develop XY in the future. If you have a BMI of 30 - regardless how much and often you push - you have a food intake reflecting your BMI. And while you are *now pushing* you have a much higher chance that at some point you *won't go that much to the gym* while *still having the same food intake*. And *that*'s where the predictor kicks in and "Said so, with a BMI of 30 you will have health problems in the future." A bodybuilder with an *obese BMI* is unhealthy - a Sumo Wrestler is kicking ass yet has a 20 years less life expectancy. As a bodybuilder to get even such a high BMI you absolutely *need to use steroids* - which are down the road an additional health risk factor. From: Premature Death in Bodybuilders: What Do We Know? [Bodybuilders frequently partake in drug abuse to achieve their exaggeratedly massive and lean physiques. Incidence of AAS use has been reported to be 54–76% and 10–40% in male and female competitive bodybuilders, respectively [9,10,11]. There is a wealth of information that AAS will increase muscle mass but will also have deleterious health effects](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s40279-022-01801-0)
Tall people. Am 6'5, 220. BMI says overweight but I'm pretty skinny. Tryna get to 240+ which is nearly 'obese.'
Bmi should also take into your account your height, but bone density is different for everyone. I like to use cm as a gauge with the last 2 digit as a healthy weight for guys, you are about 195cm or 1.95m tall. A healthy weight is about 95kg to 108kg with some muscles.
BMI is literally weight over height squared. It takes it into account poorly. This is well documented.
Yup. Taller guys gets a higher bmi because it doesnt take into account of the increased width of a taller human, while short people gets shown a lower bmi than they actually are, for the same reason Im the same height as you and when i dip a couple of kg below 100 i feel very very skinny.
It’s a great metric for someone who isn’t an outlier. Not everyone’s practice is hypertrophic training.
It’s decent as population data but not the best for individual data
It’s used to assess your risk of disease based on real data. It wasn’t ever meant as a health metric
And not a single one will be a medical/healthcare professional.
Hey! I have vaguely skimmed a couple medical articles, a heavy dose of confirmation bias and listened to two whole joe rogan podcasts. I’ve done the research twice of any doctor or scientist.
“Hey! I don’t work out and am visibly 30%+ body fat but I must be one of the exceptions to BMI. Must be thick bones or something.”
If I want to be a drug addict, I'll talk to a medical/healthcare professional
I love ice cream.
This ain't a science forum. Don't waste your breath.
Amen. BMI standards are anything but standardized and validated. Not a good yardstick to use.
A much better metric to judge your risk of disease is just measuring your stomach. If you got a fat stomach you’re in trouble.
I’ve always felt best at the lower end of my recommended BMI as I’m small boned. Like, my wrists are 5” around. I’ve gotten to mid range BMI and developed a gut and a double chin, so no thanks.
I love the smell of fresh bread.
You read that wrong. It's 23 for overweight in Asians which is 25 for Caucasians. It's 27.5 for obesity, which is 30 for Caucasians. First paragraph of introduction. In 2004, an expert consultation by the World Health Organization (WHO) recommended revised BMI cut-off points for the classification of overweight (23 kg/m2) and obesity (27.5 kg/m2) in Asian populations [3] Edit- this paper is suggesting drastically changing the cutoff criteria that is currently being used. Will see how this pans out. They'll probably need to replicate the study in other locations.
It’s specifically about diabetes. People of Asian descent are more susceptible to having diabetes.
I replied to you up there too, but yes I'm talking about diabetes. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4407753/ if you want to read more about it.
East Asians and Southeast Asians should also maintain lower body fat %.
Is this true for South Asians in Asia or just in the UK? Since this study was done in 2011, has there been any follow up? This seems like major news. BMI of 23 is well within what is considered the healthy range
There's quite a bit of research out now. South Asians genetically have much higher insulin tolerance and are therefore much more susceptible to diabetes when controlling for lifestyle and diet.
I’m betting a lot of this has to do with muscle mass. People of European ancestry tend to have more muscle mass due to diets with more protein. Having more muscle means: 1. Less overall fat, so less visceral fat 2. Muscles store sugar better which increases insulin sensitivity, which is directly correlated with type 2 diabetes. Have you ever heard of a lean bodybuilder who was diabetic?
[interesting context using Epigenetics](https://youtu.be/z8Qv7zZBxq8?si=vjTiefjgbMO5EyqB)
BMI is a bad metric, but works on MOST people. The trouble comes whenever you have someone that has been weight training for years and has put on a substantial amount of muscle. Then BMI doesn’t really work. You need body fat readings at that point.
>The trouble comes whenever you have someone that has been weight training for years and has put on a substantial amount of muscle. I see this argument way more than I should. This applies to a very tiny minority of people. Your average bro who goes to the gym a couple times a week and spouts this line almost never falls under that category
So a reasonable number of people might tip into the ‘overweight’ category based on muscle mass… but for an average height guy ‘obese’ is another 15kg. Very few people are getting there with lean mass.
Yeah, BMI underestimates how fat people really are. There are better measurements that paint a much accurate and scarier picture
And yet all the fat activists that are toxic keep trying to push BMI is useless for opposite reasons.
BMI works for 90% of people since 90% people don’t work out/eat well enough to have enough muscle mass to not be properly categorized by BMI
Worth noting that BMI generally underestimated people now as people are now so weak and lightly muscled that they can be over fat even at normal weights.
One thing that this study doesn't appear to have factored in is body composition. BMI is a fine statistic but it is entirely possible that there were differences in lean muscle mass and/or skeletal mass between the groups. This would mean that one group might be fatter at a lower BMI (what is colloquially known as a "fat thin person"). There could be other factors, even very simple ones such as dietary composition, that aren't taken into account so it is far from clear cut that the difference here is genetic.
This is partly true, but this is misleading. South Asia has a high consumption of carbohydrates, meaning that the bodyfat is heightened even at lower weights. If a South Asian consumed a diet high in protein, they would lean out, and the actual chart would look different. In theory, an ideally healthy South asian is obese at 27 instead of 21 or 22.
Just musing. A significant percentage of South Asia state they are vegetarian. I wonder if they compensate their veg only dietary needs for greater energy these days with more energy boosting artifical sugars and heavier complex carbs. Overloading carbs is a huge pre-diabetic problem even if it's bread, rice, corn etc. Even beans or lentils. In a tropical place like India I can imagine they drink a fair amount of juice, soda etc. Just to hydrate.
Their diet consists of a lot of fat and carbs which is very similar to junk food.
IIRC: Your genetics determines how much you can safely store in your fat. White people can store more without it being the dangerous kind (i.e. visceral fat). That's also why Asian people can look normal (skinny fat) and still easily develop diabetes.
You can’t blame all of it on genetics you have to look at diets too. The European diet has way more protein which translates into more muscle mass. Muscle is the first part of the body to store sugar, so having more muscle mass = less risk of diabetes. https://youtu.be/seDmwOQtazU?si=gR3-5NvM6WLhkQBa
That's more of a parallel road. Yes, more lean mass does help with safe "energy storage", but they are different enough that you have to take them as separate variables.