Why are we still using BMI?

Why are we still using the BMI?

And why on earth does a simple mathematical formula - [weight (kg) / height (cm) / height (cm)] x 10,000 – create so much agita amongst women?

The agita part I can’t answer, but I’ll tell you why we still use the BMI: because it is an easy, free way to assess one aspect of your health that is accessible and understandable to everyone. And because this measurement has demonstrated over many decades to be correlated to certain metabolic and disease states.

Does it offer perfect, irrefutable answers to whether or not you are “too fat,” taking into account the totality of who you are? Nope. It is ONE TOOL. If you want to hang a picture perfectly straight, you don’t just use a hammer, you also employ a tape measure and level. And if you want perfect data about whether or not you are tending towards the overweight and thus at increased risk for various diseases and an early grave, there are multiple other tools you can use – you could have a caliper/skin-fold test, you could weigh yourself underwater, or you could use an Xray absorption test, to name just a few – all of which offer increased accuracy and more (better?) data. They also probably cost something in terms of time and money.

But truth be told, you don’t need ANY of these, because you already know.

Instead of railing against all these imperfect tools supposedly imposed on us by the patriarchy, why don’t we ask ourselves some tough questions and make the shifts we know we need to make in order to live our best, healthiest lives?