Doctors may use these variations when advising or treating conditions in specific people. The following table by the WHO shows some comparisons and cutoff points that may apply. The results of one 2011 study found that Asian American people within the healthy weight range were more likely to have symptoms of metabolic syndrome than their non-Hispanic white counterparts. In Korea, they added, there is evidence to suggest that almost twice as many people have features of metabolic obesity but a moderate weight compared with the United States. In 2017, Korean researchers pointed out that people in the Asia-Pacific region often have a higher risk of type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease at a BMI below the existing World Health Organization (WHO) cutoff point of 25 kg/m 2.
They concluded that to predict obesity-type body fat percentage, the standard BMI threshold of 29.9 kilograms per square meter (kg/m 2) was appropriate for males but that a more suitable cutoff point for females appeared to be 24.9 kg/m 2. Some evidence suggests that the associations between BMI, body fat percentage, and body fat distribution may differ across populations due to variations in sex, race, and ethnicity.Ī Brazilian study from 2017 looked at the correlation between BMI and body fat percentage in 856 adult males and females.
