When it comes to weight, the Twin Cities are solidly normal
Posted at 2:26 PM on March 6, 2013
by Bob Collins
(7 Comments)
Filed under: Health
When it comes to pudge, Minneapolis-Saint Paul, you're no Boulder, Colorado.
The Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index is out today, showing the Twin Cities weighing in at #38.
The survey is based on interviews with 350,000 in 2011, with those surveyed reporting their height and weight, which is averaged out to a body mass index, or BMI.
Anything above a 30 is considered obese. (ed note: Previous version of post indicated percentages listed was BMI; it is not.)
MSP registered with 22.4% of its people obese. Duluth checked in at 22.9. Those are the only two Minnesota cities on the list. In the state as a whole, 24.7% are obese.
Madison, Wisconsin had both beat, however, with 22.1%. That puts it at 33rd on the list, although we suspect the numbers were skewed by thin Minnesotans who attend the University of Wisconsin. Over all, 27% of Wisconsin people are obese.
And if you'd like to calculate your own BMI, here's a calculator.
And here's the state-by-state map.
Comments (7)
"Participants reported their height and weight"
Meaning this list might not be so much a list of where the thinnest people are so much as a list of where the those most likely to lie about their weight are.
An average BMI of 12.1 means that half the people are above and half are below...
Given that a minimum to be alive would be around 12.1 for a woman, and assuming that half of boulders population is female, I hope that the half above 12.1 is the female half.
my BMI = 42.7
Were the majority of these people interviewed in July/August or January/February? Something tells me the average BMI in our fair state shifts quite a bit between seasons.
// An average BMI of 12.1 means that half the people are above and half are below...
I believe -- and this is hardly my strong suit -- you're describing a median, not an average.
Aren't these numbers telling us the percentage of people in each metro area that are obese?
"A new Gallup-Healthways poll has found that at least 15 percent of residents in 187 of the 190 metro areas surveyed are obese." I don't think that it's saying that people in Denver have an average BMI of 12.1.
Yes. Fixed
Paragraph two in this story summarizes why I cannot take BMI studies seriously.
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