Jonah Lomu is fat … according to the official method of measuring obesity, the body mass index. There must be a better way, says Michael Hann So who is Jonah Lomu.
There are not many sportsmen in the world who have made an impact on their sport as great as Jonah Lomu has.
He burst onto the scene during the 1995 World Cup in South Africa aged 19, scoring eight tries, helping New Zealand to reach the final.
Since then, Jonah has become the most famous rugby player in the world.
He has become a role model for young rugby players in New Zealand and across the world.
Ah, there, Jonah Lomu is apparently the Michael Jordan of rugby. In this country one would substitute Michael Jordan in the headline and get the same effect. Many world class athletes have high BMI (body mass index). The body mass index does work for most patients. This article makes some interesting points about when we should not use BMI and discusses a better indicator of disease risk – body fat.
Well, that shudder may have been a little premature, because in individual cases the formula is not as helpful as you might believe. The BMI, a method used worldwide to determine how healthy a person’s weight is, is based on the relationship between an individual’s height and weight. At a reading of 25 or above, you are overweight. But so, according to the calculations, is Mel Gibson. And at 30, you become obese; but so are Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jonah Lomu and Sylvester Stallone.
The simplicity of the BMI makes it a godsend for looking at trends. But it is also something of a broad-brush tool. It takes no account of age, sex or race; it makes no allowance for your fitness. Most importantly, it does not measure how much fat you are carrying or how that fat is distributed.
Professor Ian Macdonald, co-editor of the International Journal of Obesity, explains that the fat you need to worry about is abdominal fat. Fat above the hips puts a strain on your heart, putting you at risk. Below the hips, it is not such a problem.
The system also fails to take into account the amount of fat you are carrying – hence the reason for the “obesity” of Jonah, Arnie and Sly. Dense, muscled physiques can weigh more than flabby, unfit ones, with the result that the superfit can end up being categorised as obese.
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He says that too many health professionals in this country do not understand that a healthy weight is about more than a BMI reading. “I’ve been on a personal crusade about it,” he says. “But it’s what doctors in this country have always been taught.”
Campbell, Macdonald and others say there is an easy and simple alternative: look at your waist size. For men, a waist size of more than 91cm (36in) should give you cause for concern. More than 101cm (40in) and you need to lose weight urgently. The equivalent figures for women are 80cm (32.5in) and 88cm (34.5in). By this criterion, Lomu, with his 27in waist, kicks the obesity tag into touch.
Macdonald, though, offers a word of caution to those who think this gives them an excuse to avoid that trip to the gym: “You can’t get away with saying, ‘I’ve got a big frame, so this doesn’t apply to me.’ It does.”
