Katie Owen is an early developer.  Like a lot of girls her age, she’s hit puberty fairly early, and as such, she’s significantly taller and older-looking than her former classmates at Hunters Hall Primary School.  She’s a robust 5 feet tall and a solid, but not portly, 110 pounds.  That was weight enough for her BMI as determined by Britain’s National Child Measurement Scheme to be 21.5, within the normal range but apparently high enough for officials at Barking & Dagenham’s NHS branch to send Katie and mother Joanne Owen a letter saying her daughter was overweight.  Since then, Katie doesn’t want to eat.

“To put her through something like this when she is reaching such an important time in her life is just cruel,” says Katie’s mother Joanne.  “So many teenage girls starve themselves and become anorexic, which is really unhealthy and traumatic for the whole family.  I couldn’t bear it if that happened to my daughter.”

Here’s the thing:  I’m looking at the same picture of the girl you are.  Does she look fat to you?  Because I don’t see it.  She looks very tall and a bit broad-shouldered and otherwise very healthy and normal for her age.  How this girl gets a letter saying she’s overweight I’ll never know.  This is just another example of why the BMI is a horrible judge of health.

Tags: Katie Owen, National Child Measurement Scheme, BMI, Body Mass Index, Barking & Dagenham NHS, Joanne Owen, schoolgirl sent letter saying she was overweight, health service, National Health Service, unusual medical news, emotional health

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