Belly fat linked to early death, study finds

WASHINGTON: It's more bad news for America's growing waistline: Excess belly fat is associated with a higher risk of early death from any cause, regardless of how much overall body fat you have, a new study finds, foreign media reported.

In women, each 10-centimeter increase in belly fat raised the risk of death from any cause by 8%. For men, each 10-centimeter increase in girth raised the risk of by 12%. The better news: Larger hips and thighs are associated with a lower risk of early death, according to the study published by the The BMJ on Wednesday. That may be due to a protective effect that fat on those areas provide toward higher cholesterol and blood sugar levels, according to prior studies.

Those findings are a result of an analysis of 72 studies involving more than 2.5 million participants who were studied from three to 24 years. All of the studies explored various measures of weight around the middle of the body, long thought to be a significant risk factor for metabolic resistance, which is a precursor to diabetes, heart disease and more.

"Our results suggest that measures of central adiposity (fat) could be used as a supplementary approach, in combination with body mass index, to determine the risk of premature death," the authors said.