A global group of experts has suggested a new approach to diagnosing and treating obesity that does not rely solely on the much-contested body mass index (BMI).

A new report says only using BMI to determine if a patient has obesity leads to under-diagnosing people who are ill and over-diagnosing people who don't currently deal with the negative health consequences of obesity.

Obesity, long determined by the flawed metric of BMI, should be diagnosed based on other measurements, experts argue.

Instead of using the controversial body mass index, or BMI, to assess weight, an international group of scientists proposes an approach that looks at how excess body fat affects health

As of March 2020, nearly 42% of US adults had obesity, with the report estimating that more than a billion people are living with obesity worldwide.

BMI is used to classify individuals as underweight, healthy weight, overweight, or obese based on their height and weight. It is calculated by dividing weight in kilograms by health in meters squared.

But the risk to health and wellbeing is not determined by weight – and therefore BMI – alone. We've been part of a global collaboration that has spent the past two years discussing how this should change.

A group of global experts is proposing a new way to define and diagnose obesity, reducing the emphasis on the controversial body mass index and hoping to better identify people who need treatment for the disease caused by excess body fat.