This should be fun to watch.
This should be fun to watch. One question, though, about the final quote in the article. How do they know there's a protective effect if people aren't living long enough to demonstrate it? Furthermore, exactly what kind of living quality is existing with dementia?
“So even if there is a protective effect against dementia from being overweight or obese, you’re not living long enough to benefit from it,” Qizilbash was quoted as saying by the Times.
Oversimplified, but if I lived to 65 firing on all cylinders and fully active, versus I lived until 80, but 10 of those years were in a care facility as I became not only less and less of me, but less and less of a whole being, would those extra 5 years of presumed mostly functioning (because things like Alzheimer's usually don't just pop up overnight) be worth the other 10?
It's not that simple, but based on this reporting, even the authors were trying really hard to find a reason that being overweight (by current standards) was wrong and bad. Well, maybe they accidentally ate something good for them. Well, they might not be demented, but they'll still die younger. Etc.
Maybe it's just never that simple. Maybe it's a question of balance - not too fat, not too thin. Maybe biology is complex. Maybe the scientific evidence we have that visceral fat contributes to what are generally considered damaging inflammatory states in the body, and that it can function as an endocrine-like organ, suggests the possibility that maybe there are things it could do that might be beneficial, and we just haven't found them yet.
P.S. I find it interesting that to illustrate "fat" they didn't choose a photo of someone merely moderately overweight.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/new-research-being-fat-in-middle-age-cuts-risk-of-developing-dementia/2015/04/10/c87512ec-df52-11e4-a1b8-2ed88bc190d2_story.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/new-research-being-fat-in-middle-age-cuts-risk-of-developing-dementia/2015/04/10/c87512ec-df52-11e4-a1b8-2ed88bc190d2_story.html
“So even if there is a protective effect against dementia from being overweight or obese, you’re not living long enough to benefit from it,” Qizilbash was quoted as saying by the Times.
Oversimplified, but if I lived to 65 firing on all cylinders and fully active, versus I lived until 80, but 10 of those years were in a care facility as I became not only less and less of me, but less and less of a whole being, would those extra 5 years of presumed mostly functioning (because things like Alzheimer's usually don't just pop up overnight) be worth the other 10?
It's not that simple, but based on this reporting, even the authors were trying really hard to find a reason that being overweight (by current standards) was wrong and bad. Well, maybe they accidentally ate something good for them. Well, they might not be demented, but they'll still die younger. Etc.
Maybe it's just never that simple. Maybe it's a question of balance - not too fat, not too thin. Maybe biology is complex. Maybe the scientific evidence we have that visceral fat contributes to what are generally considered damaging inflammatory states in the body, and that it can function as an endocrine-like organ, suggests the possibility that maybe there are things it could do that might be beneficial, and we just haven't found them yet.
P.S. I find it interesting that to illustrate "fat" they didn't choose a photo of someone merely moderately overweight.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/new-research-being-fat-in-middle-age-cuts-risk-of-developing-dementia/2015/04/10/c87512ec-df52-11e4-a1b8-2ed88bc190d2_story.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/new-research-being-fat-in-middle-age-cuts-risk-of-developing-dementia/2015/04/10/c87512ec-df52-11e4-a1b8-2ed88bc190d2_story.html
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