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Don't use body mass index to determine whether people are healthy

University of California - Los Angeles

Relying on body mass index (BMI), a numerical measure of a person's height and weight, as a proxy for health incorrectly labels more than 54 million heavy Americans unhealthy when they are not, psychologists report. Many of these 'healthy obese' and 'healthy overweight' people may have to pay higher health insurance premiums..

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