Parents alert! Chances of your child developing diabetes and potentially dying from the disease are foreshadowed early life and at weights that fall within a normal range, a new study indicates.
What is shocking is that the data suggests that when the BMI of teenagers were within the normal range indicated an increased likelihood of dying from the disease.
Researchers in Israel followed the destiny of millions of the country’s teenagers. The teens were weighed at age 17 and scientists noted that the likelihood of their dying from diabetes-related causes by the age of 70 was tied to heavier weights of subjects during their teen years.
Co-author, Hagai Levine of Hebrew University-Hadassah School of Public Health and Community Medicine in Jerusalem said that the study provides further evidence for public health actions to overcome the childhood obesity epidemic.
“Overall, elevated BMI at adolescence, including values within the currently accepted ‘normal’ range, strongly increase the risk of diabetes mortality later in life,” Levine said.
The research, which featured data on more than two million Israeli adolescents who being evaluated for military service when being evaluated between 1967 and 2010. The teens were divided into groups based on their age, sex and body mass index (BMI).
The researchers followed the entire group using national medical records and discovered that 481 deaths caused by diabetes at an average age of 50.
Traditionally BMIs between 18.5 and 24.9 are considered to be in the healthy range. 25 to 29.9 is considered overweight, and 30 and above is considered obese. But researchers have noted that a starting point BMI of 22.4 that teenagers whose BMI gradually increased also increased their likelihood of later dying from diabetes. But teens with a BMI of between 18 and 20 had the lowest risk of dying from the disease.
What is shocking is that the data suggests that when the BMI of teenagers were within the normal range indicated an increased likelihood of dying from the disease.
Researchers believe that parents, regardless of their child’s weight, should encourage their children to develop healthy eating habits and encourage them to stay physically active.
