Which is more detrimental Smoking or Obesity?

Researchers reported in a study that heart attacks are hitting the overweight more than a decade sooner than "normal" weight people. "The leading theory in cardiology right now is that the fat tissue is actually producing factors that precipitate heart attacks," said lead author Dr. Peter McCullough, consultant cardiologist and chief of nutrition and prevention medicine at William Beaumont Hospital in Royal Oak, Michigan.

A study of more than 111,000 people showed that obesity is more dangerous to the heart than smoking. Why? Researchers found the answer of this question, they found that cholesterol builds up in the coronary arteries and inflammatory or other chemicals produced by fat cells trigger the plaque to suddenly rupture, causing a blood clot to form and unleashing an acute heart attack.

Until now, researchers didn't have enough studies whether obesity is associated with premature heart attacks, added McCullough. McCullough and his team analyzed data from a nationwide U.S. registry of people hospitalized for heart attack and unstable angina, or chest pain, from 2001 to 2007.

In the final analysis were included a total of 111,847 men and women who had experienced a first heart attack. They were grouped according to their body mass index (BMI), a measure of body fat based on height and weight. According to these studies researchers found at least that, the heavier the person, the younger the age of a first heart attack.

The most obese people had their heart attacks on average when they were 59. In a study were compared to about 75 for the leanest group (average body weight 47 kilograms, or about 103 pounds, meaning they were actually considered underweight), and 71 for people of "normal" weight, where the average weight is 65 kilograms, or about 142 pounds. According to this study researchers found that most obese group had a BMI of 40 or more and weighed on average 127 kilograms, or 280 pounds.

The rate of diabetes was 17 percent in the leanest group, and 49 per cent in the most obese. All the patients, regardless of body size, had about the same level of LDL cholesterol, the so-called bad cholesterol thought to be a major risk factor for heart attacks. That means the excess fat is causing heart disease in other ways, McCullough says.

The people at the highest body weight on average lost 12 years of life before their first heart attack, but smokers lost just 10 years of life before a first heart attack. This is really the first study that shows now that some factors are more powerful than smoking in terms of the prematurely of myocardial infarction.