From John.Komlos at econhist.vwl.uni-muenchen.de Thu Dec 11 05:08:27 2003 From: John.Komlos at econhist.vwl.uni-muenchen.de (John Komlos) Date: Wed Nov 16 18:04:32 2005 Subject: EHB: Life expectancy Message-ID: ----------------- EHB POSTING ----------------- A research group is interested in finding a cooperation partner to work on recent European developments in health-adjusted life expectancy using anthropometric indicators for purposes of health and life expectancy projections. Would anyone be interested in exploring this matter further? If so, please let me know. My understanding is that a little bit of financial support is available. J. Komlos ------------ FOOTER TO EHB POSTING ------------ For information, send the message "info EHB" to lists@eh.net. From John.Komlos at econhist.vwl.uni-muenchen.de Fri Dec 19 09:09:58 2003 From: John.Komlos at econhist.vwl.uni-muenchen.de (John Komlos) Date: Wed Nov 16 18:04:32 2005 Subject: EHB: Call for papers Message-ID: ----------------- EHB POSTING ----------------- Call for papers Special Issue of Economics and Human Biology The purpose of this special issue will be to explore in depth the association between anthropometric measures (such as height, weight, bmi) on the one hand, and health, mortality, and labor productivity (income) on the other. The concept of health should be interpreted broadly to include specific diseases as well as subjective indicators. We are not only interested in weight but also in birth-weight as well as in overweight (obesity). Moreover, papers dealing with the forecasting of obesity and its health consequences, and the use of anthropometric indicators for the estimation and forecasting of health adjusted life expectancy is of interest. Papers which fall within this set of issues - without temporal or geographic limitations - are welcome. Potential contributors are encouraged to send an abstract of the proposed paper to the editor john.komlos@econhist.de, who would be pleased to comment on its suitability for the special issue. Submissions should conform to EHB format. Papers are due by 31st December 2004. http://www.elsevier.com/homepage/sae/econworld/econbase/ehb/frame.htm I would like to bring to your attention two recent papers that are quite relevant in this regard, but might have eluded your attention: Anders Engeland, et al., 2003, Body Mass Index in Adolescence in Relation to Total Mortality… Am J. Epidemiology 157, 517-23. _______, 2003, Height and Body Mass Index in Relation to Total Mortality. Epidemiology, May, 14, 3, 293-99. Look forward to hearing from you. John Komlos ------------ FOOTER TO EHB POSTING ------------ For information, send the message "info EHB" to lists@eh.net. From John.Komlos at econhist.vwl.uni-muenchen.de Sun Dec 21 18:41:37 2003 From: John.Komlos at econhist.vwl.uni-muenchen.de (John Komlos) Date: Wed Nov 16 18:04:32 2005 Subject: EHB: For those interested in BMI Message-ID: ----------------- EHB POSTING ----------------- This interesting abstract was brought to my attention by Tim Cuff: Title: Body mass index: a measure for longevity. Author(s): Shiner JS; Uehlinger DE Author's Address: Abteilung Nephrologie, Inselspital, Bern, Switzerland. shiner@alumni.duke.edu Source: Medical hypotheses [Med Hypotheses] 2001 Dec; 57 (6), pp. 780-3. Journal Info: Country of Publication: Scotland NLM ID: 7505668 ISSN: 0306-9877 Data Interpretation, Statistical; Evolution; Female; Human; Male; Models, Biological Abstract: Body mass index has important predictive value for mortality and morbidity both in normal subjects and in those suffering from particular pathologies. However, body mass index was introduced as a measure of body fat, which might not be expected to have such wide implications for various pathological conditions. We argue here that body mass index may actually be a measure for longevity. Our arguments are based on a well-established allometric scaling law for physiological time. The time between heart beats, the time between respirations, and longevity all scale as body weight to the 1/4 power in mammalian species ranging from shrews to blue whales. We find that body mass index also scales with body weight to the 1/4 power in humans from birth to one year of age, and again from approximately 5 to 17 years of age. On the assumption that in these two growth phases humans scale as do species, we postulate that body mass index is a measure of longevity. ------------ FOOTER TO EHB POSTING ------------ For information, send the message "info EHB" to lists@eh.net.