Let me put it out there: Body mass index is the devil.

Scratch that. It’s worse.

Lucifer probably is working out more, getting fat shamed, going to counseling and rededicating himself to better nutritional standards right now because his BMI crept from the overweight category into the obese realm.

Silly scene? Sure. Probably belongs in the next “Scary Movie” spoof film. But it’s no more ridiculous than our insistence on using BMI to dictate policy.

I have written about this in the past. Odds are good, considering how slow humans are to adopt anything that requires effort, I will write about it again.

BMI is a measure of body composition based on height and weight. A Belgian statistician developed the measure in the 1800s. Even then, he said the formula shouldn’t be used to measure individuals.

BMI doesn’t account for bodily proportions. There are many athletes who are considered overweight or obese according to BMI. It also is flawed when it comes to children and pregnant women.

BMI doesn’t pass the common sense logic test either: If a person is overweight or obese, he will have a high BMI. The opposite isn’t true.

I have a high BMI – 30.5 (6 feet, 225 pounds). But with a body fat percentage in the mid-teens, few, if any, consider me overweight or obese.

Yet, here we are. The use of BMI is everywhere. The policies decided because of BMI are growing in number every day:

– France has instituted a law requiring models, deemed too thin, to be of a certain BMI before they can walk the runway.

– There are insurance companies that charge higher premiums to those with higher BMI numbers.

– The FAA, in order to battle sleep apnea in the cockpit, is suggesting that pilots with a BMI over a certain level undergo testing by board-certified sleep specialists.

– The state of California told my then 13-year-old daughter, who passed all of the state’s physical fitness tests with ease, that she was overweight because BMI said so.

– Airlines throughout the world imposed regulations on flight attendants’ size based on BMI.

– In 2010, the Department of Health and Human Services mandated that electronic health records all Americans should have had by 2014 include BMI.

Folks, I could go on and on.

Singled out, BMI is fine. It’s a computation that is supposed to be used for massive studies and not on individuals. The problem comes when it’s used on an individual basis and rules are adopted as a result.

I’m not naive. BMI is easy and, more importantly, cheap. That’s why it’s widely used.

But hydrostatic weighing tells us more. Hip-to-waist ratios tell us more. Body fat percentages tell us more. The body adiposity index (a computation of height and waist circumference) tells us more.

If better health and fitness are the goals, let’s hope the folks in decision- making positions start using better measuring tools.

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Bryant is an author and lecturer who holds several national training certifications. Email him at movingthefuture@gmail.com.

Milo Bryant – Moving the Future