The link between poor physical fitness and increased risk of cardiovascular disease is not fully understood, but may be mediated through the accumulation of body fat. Evidence is accumulating that obese individuals have chronic systemic chronic inflammation and that this inflammation might in some way be associated with the amount of adipose tissue present. For example, individuals with higher waist to hip ratios had lower levels of plasma ascorbic acid, suggesting that chronic inflammation might deplete the body of antioxidants and lead to disease. Research1 has investigated the association between physical fitness, adiposity, body mass index (BMI) and inflammatory markers in 176 healthy men and women. Physical fitness and adiposity was assessed at baseline, and blood tests were used to identify the levels of inflammatory markers C-reactive protein (CRP, interleukin 6 (IL-6). Inflammation and adiposity was re-assessed at a 3 year follow-up.
The results of this study showed that BMI was independently associated with IL-6 and CRP at the 3 year follow-up, and that weight gain was also associated with CRP. Unfit-overweight individuals had significantly higher concentrations of CRP and IL-6 compared with fit-lean subjects. However, fit-overweight individuals and unfit-lean individuals did not show statistically significant differences from the fit-lean subjects after statistical adjustments. Therefore it appears that inflammation is associated adiposity but not physical fitness. This supports previous findings that demonstrates a positive relationship between adiposity and chronic inflammation, and also suggests that the protective effects of exercise and physical fitness may stem partly from reductions in adiposity with training. These results also suggests that fit overweight subjects may have a lower risk for cardiovascular disease than their unfit counter parts.
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