The evidence is building—fat matters

If your New Year's Resolution was to walk more and eat less, you could be smarter at this time next year.

Auriel Willette and Brandon Klinedinst of Iowa State University discovered people mostly in their 40s and 50s who had higher amounts of fat in their mid-section had worse fluid intelligence as they got older. Greater muscle mass, by contrast, appeared to be a protective factor. These relationships stayed the same even after taking into account chronological age, level of education, and socioeconomic status.

Highlights https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0889159119306531

• Adiposity exacerbated cognitive aging.

• Greater muscle mass was protective against cognitive aging.

• The effect of muscle on cognition was more than adiposity.

• Lymphocytes, eosinophils, and basophils may link adiposity to cognitive outcomes.

• Sex-specific mechanisms of action were noted among eosinophils and basophils.

Also, Intermittent fasting could be added to medical school curricula alongside standard advice about healthy diets and exercise.

https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/newsroom/news-releases/intermittent-fasting-live-fast-live-longer

Belly fat, shin splints and bumble bees

The clouds in the west are very dark this morning. I know Illinois* had some tough weather, and it is probably our turn. So I changed into my newish athletic shoes and walked briskly for a mile. Boy! I just hate to sweat, and I'm not athletic, but I read that it's easier to get rid of belly fat through brisk walking even if the same amount of calories are burned with a stroll. Belly fat was not in my range of vision until about 7 or 8 years ago, and then suddenly it appeared. If your bottom rib doesn't reside on your pelvis, you have a huge advantage, but when you get broad band and write 11 blogs, that advantage leaves you. (That's my excuse, not aging.) Yesterday our exercise class couldn't get in the room to get out the weights, so we all took a walk (started briskly, slowed to a crawl) over to Thompson Park, then to Rita's house for a bathroom break, then back to UALC Lytham.

But when I walk, I get shin splints, so I stop and do some stretches--and that seems to help. For me, stretching during the walk helps even more than stretching before, although that seems backwards. Still, when walking around the condo grounds I think I must look a little odd in the half crouch--but at 9 a.m., maybe everyone was still in bed.

On my walk I saw a dead bumble bee--a big one in someone's driveway (there are more than 250 species and subspecies in 15 subgenera, so I can't say which one). Not sure what happened. Maybe he had a collision, wasn't looking both ways when a car backed out. Death. Have you read Genesis lately? There was no death before Adam and Eve disobeyed God. They had tried to use vegetation to hide, but God gave them animal skins. Death of animals even before Cain murdered Abel. But the theory of evolution, the original hate speech, teaches us that millions, maybe billions of years of death transpired so that poor dead bumble bee could throw his magnificent body away on May 16 here at the condo.

*The 3 story apartment building reported in this story is the former Kable Inn, built in 1894, but it had several names before the Kable Brothers Co. bought it in 1921. The earliest family story I heard about this place was that my great-grandfather checked in there with his large and growing family when they arrived from TN, and he was told to get a house.

Photo from Bird Perch She has great stuff!

Small waist, heavy hips

We're not in great demand as movie stars or models, but I've never seen any medical studies attributing cardiovascular disease, psoriasis, breast cancer or Alzheimer's to my body shape (the classic pear). Yes, there's more bad belly news, according to the latest issue of Neurology. Large amounts of belly fat are associated with declining cognition. Just being over weight or obese nearly doubles the risk of dementia in old age, according to this study by Rachel Whitmer which looked at 6,583 who were middle age between 1964-1973. Central body fat increases the risk even more, and normal weight people with high belly fat have an elevated risk of dementia.

"What that tells you is the effect of the belly is over and above that of being overweight," Whitmer said. "One of the take-home messages is it's not just your weight but where you carry your weight in middle age that is a strong predictor of dementia."

But here's a bright spot: it's much easier to lose belly weight than those dimpled thighs or buttocks. So cut those calories and start exercising--it's the only way.

WaPo story which has been reprinted in most major newspapers.

There may be something different in this latest study, but this information also appeared 3 years in BMJ: Whitmer RA, Gunderson EP, Barrett-Connor E, Quesenberry CP Jr, Yaffe K. "Obesity in middle age and future risk of dementia: a 27 year longitudinal population based study." BMJ 2005;330:1360.