Congratulations to Barnsley NHS for giving Thomas Halton (a fit healthy 11 year old) a complex about his diet.
Tom is not fat and eats a well balanced diet, plus he has an active lifestyle.
However, the "fat police" from Barnsley NHS measured his weight recently and decreed that, for his age, his Body Mass Index (BMI) was a tad too high.
Here is a small factoid that makes their conclusion bollocks:
The BMI ranges they use are based on recommend BMI's according to age, the range does not properly take into account height.
Aha, can you see where the problem lies here children?
Yes, that's right Tom is 5ft 1in (slightly taller than the average 11 year old). Therefore his weight of 7st 10lb (Nanny wants him to be under 7st 7lb) is perfectly OK for someone if his height.
Perfectly OK that is unless you use the BMI chart that Barnsley NHS were using. The result was that the NHS sent his parents a letter warning that unless he changes his lifestyle (can an 11 year old actually have a "lifestyle"?) he would be at a higher risk of cancer, type-two diabetes and heart disease etc etc.
Tom was so upset by this that he is now refusing to eat.
Well done Nanny!
Sharon Stoltz, assistant director for public health in Barnsley, said that the local NHS were following a Government initiative; ie she took the "we were only following orders" approach!
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I think this is a case for m'learned friends. Surely the Barnsley Bonehead's could be sued for child abuse or something?
ReplyDeleteThe biggest problem for BMI is that it doesn't take into account differences in bone structure and muscle mass, as well as any medical conditions that can cause, for example, slow bowel movements, increased water retention etc etc.
ReplyDeleteNo matter how much fat I could remove from my body, I'd have to "let myself go" and lose muscle mass before I could ever get near the supposed ideal weight based on BMI. And I'm no athlete, that I can tell you!
My eldest kid was "borderline" overweight on his school BMI check. It's such a joke when you look at him - he's all skin and bones, barely an ounce of fat on him.
Of course, we all know BMI is bollocks - it's obvious when you stop to think about, so why do quangos within the NHS not get it?
Here's hoping that particular bunch of morons will be in Cameron's 40%!
BMI is part of Nanny's one size fits all policy.
ReplyDeleteMost professional athletes would be considered overweight using BMI as a guide.
What concerns me more, is just why the schools see weighing pupils as part of their remit. It seems that the state is continuing to expand its area of interference.
The fundamental problem with all of Nanny's one size fits all diktats is that it relies on people with commonsense to oversee them; as I have said before; commonsense is not common within the public sector.
Ken, I am 6' 3" and slightly overweight at 14.5 stones, aged 54. Iamagine my shock to discover that if I were less then 10st, and therefore probably just skin and bones, I would be deemed to be of an "appropriate weight".
ReplyDeleteAnd as Tonk mentions athletes, I guess that many international rugby players would be classified as obese - well I won't be in the front of the queue to tell the All Black pack that they needed to lose weight!
Regards Beancounter http://www.getactivecornwall.co.uk/feature/bmi-calculator/bmi-table/
BMI has the advantage, for the beancounters, that it can be recorded as a number so it looks scientific.
ReplyDeleteThe far simpler "Can you pinch an inch?" is merely a yes/no tick box.
The nurse at our local surgery is "barrel shaped" and I dread to think what her BMI is. Yet she ticked off my 80 year old father for being slightly over the recommended figure...
ReplyDeleteWell I'm 5'10", weigh anything between 95kilos and 105 kilos depending on season (around 16 stone) and have a measured BMI of 31. The Health Police would put me down as "obese" and yes, I am a bit of a fatty. Only thing is I'm a winter swimmer - meaning Speedos only in water so cold there's ice floating on the surface. My body fat (some of which is brown fat) came with the physiological adaptation that lets me swim unprotected in water so cold that it would normally kill within minutes.
ReplyDeleteIn fact my GP has assured me that given my circumstances I am certainly NOT obese, nor indeed overweight although he does insist I lose some in summer when I don't need it.
Yes, BMI is meaningless.
I'm 5'10 and weigh 16 stone yet I am not fat. One summer evening last year, I fainted and was taken to hospital by ambulance. Turned out that I fainted due to being exhausted from over-working myself. I figured this out when I came to but the paramedics insisted that I go to A & E anyway. I was kept in overnight. The entire time I was there the doctors seemed more concerned that I was 16 stone. I'm not fat in the slightest. I'm well built, I lift weights at the gym but I'm no Arnold Schwarzenegger. This didn't seem to matter to them. I was 16 stone and therefore I am fat according to them. I told them straight that they have no idea what my bone density is nor do they no what my muscle mass is. "Lose weight.", was all I heard all night. These so called 'professionals' really know nothing at all.
ReplyDelete