As if we needed any more reasons to slim down a bit, a 2019 study of nearly 1,300 people with an average age of 64 suggests that being overweight or obese accelerates brain aging by a decade or more.
"People with bigger waists and a higher BMI were more likely to have thinning in the cortex area of the brain, which implies that obesity is associated with reduced gray matter of the brain," said study author Tatjana Rundek, M.D., Ph.D., a UHealth neurologist, professor of neurology, epidemiology, and public health and scientific director of the Evelyn F. McKnight Brain Research Institute. "These associations were especially strong in those who were younger than 65, which adds weight to the theory that having poor health indicators in mid-life may increase the risk for brain aging and problems with memory and thinking skills in later life."
Having a higher BMI was associated with having a thinner cortex, even after researchers adjusted for other factors that could affect the cortex, such as high blood pressure, alcohol use and smoking. In overweight people, every unit increase in BMI was associated with a 0.098 millimeter (mm) thinner cortex and in obese people with a 0.207 mm thinner cortex. Having a thinner cortex has been tied to an increased risk of Alzheimer's disease.
Rundek said, "In normal aging adults, the overall thinning rate of the cortical mantle is between 0.01 and 0.10 mm per decade, and our results would indicate that being overweight or obese may accelerate aging in the brain by at least a decade."
I guess the good news is that if you refuse to slim down now, you won't have to worry about it later. Or anything else for that matter.
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