MANY male motorway drivers are overweight and could cause accidents through being in poor condition, a survey showed today.
Four in five men tested at service stations were too heavy for their height and fewer than 10% knew their own waist measurement.
The fat, unhealthy drivers posed a possible threat to other road users by being likelier to have heart attacks and to nod off at the wheel, according to health education company DeVille Almond, which conducted the tests at motorway service areas.
The company invited male drivers to be tested for blood pressure, blood sugar levels, cholesterol levels, waist measurement and body mass index (BMI).
On average, drivers were 14 stone 4lb (91.6kg), with a 40.5 inch waist (102.8cm), a high pulse rate and a high BMI.
Tests
DeVille Almond applied a "traffic light" score to the results, giving a red light to those who exceeded acceptable levels in three or more of the tests, an amber light to those who failed up to two and a green light to those who passed all the tests.
Of the 226 drivers who took part, 31.9% were given a red light, 45.1% an amber light and 22.5% received a green light.
Jane DeVille Almond, director of DeVille Almond, said: "The results are a cause for concern because they indicate that there is a very high percentage of drivers on the road whose health makes them a potential hazard.
"And that's doubly worrying when it applies to professional drivers, many of whom are in charge of huge trucks.
"A waist measurement of 40 inches or more and a BMI of 30 or more can spell danger because both are indicators of a high risk of type 2 diabetes, which in turn can trigger sleep apnoea."
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Congratulations you've passed your theory test, now you need to do a mile in 10mins 30 seconds...but only if you have paid your path tax.
Watch out ace!
And I suppose being obese is likely to cause more accidents than driving like a maniac and having learnt to drive whilst playing GTA?
More anti-driver propaganda. Why can they not admit that they want us off the roads?
I guess all the women were slim and healthy, making them less likely to cause accidents!
Mcdonalds go Bust!it makes you fat.no drinking and driving Beer makes you fat.
Fish and chips are out!Come on you office wallahs'Jogging on the spot.
What pointless statistics will they come up with next?! Why is it just overweight men? surely the symptons of being overweight are the same with women. Why the link with driving? Why not link it with train drivers (more boring than driving so more likely to drift off) or operating a crane (heart attack) etc. This small little country is getting itself obsessed with drivers- bore off !!!
What a fascinating piece of research! Who commissioned it? Did Deville Almond conduct it out of concern for the public, from their own pocket or was there another motive? Come on MEN this sort of story is useless unless we have the detail. What is the research telling us? Fat blokes need to slim? Tell us something we didnt know.
Envirofascists, anti smoking fascists, now obesity fascists. Welcome to Britain 2007, or should I say Germany 1933...
Keep the propaganda coming please New Labour. An anti car Story a day and we'll soon be boarding Jolly Rogers aging bus fleet on our way to socialist nirvana!
"A waist measurement of 40 inches or more and a BMI of 30 or more can spell danger because both are indicators of a high risk of type 2 diabetes, which in turn can trigger sleep apnoea."
I think that statistics show that you are into middle age when those things happen. Whereas it is under twentyfives that kill the greater number of people -including themselves.
By the way, I have all the conditions mentioned bar the high pulse and I am past middle age - BE WARY, I will be on the M60 later today.
I agree that this is a bit silly. However, I have seen many fat men and women struggling to eat a pasty whilst driving and not being in complete control of their vehicles.
I have seen lorry drivers shovelling chips down their throats whilst supposedly being in control of a 40t truck.
Thin people tend not to have these cravings so may in fact be better drivers. Extra pounds on the girth should equal extra pounds on their insurance premiums.
Jane DeVille Almond runs the National Obesity Forum - so no self-interest there, then!
I am taking obesity very seriously and stuffing my face with even more food to annoy the health dictators. I don't smoke but am thinking of starting, just to be awkward
Was the poll conducted on Taxi drivers and white van drivers! Sounds like it to me!
Stop your moaning and do some exercise, there are very few excuses for being overweight and people have to start looking after themselves.
Many women are short, to short to see over the wheel or reach the pedals of their 4x4 without a booster seat they claim to able drive
Mr Angry; lol.
Of course, it's just more nosey parker, mamby pamby, molly coddling, dictatorial rubbish.
These people ought to find something worthwhile to do.
As somebody has commented, these people are commercially involved in obesity.
I'm just poppig off for a cream bun before I start my drive home. My only hope is that if I have a heart attack en route, I crash into a motorway services and collide with one of these cretins with a clip board and tape measure.
Can't these people study something more important to mankind?
We've had a go at smokers...
Let's have a pop at fatties!
YOU MUST CONFORM
YOU MUST CONFORM
All you healthy non smoking slim people will work hard for the economy.
Sounds like a flaming George Orwell fantasy.
LEAVE PEOPLE ALONE YOU FACISTS.
Hmmm soon they will be taxing people on BMI scales too!!!!!!!!!!
Sorry about my first piece getting cut off short, but I was driving down the road, fag in mouth, coffee splashing on the dash, bag of chips on the seat, talking on my mobile trying to type this on my laptop when an idiot with clipboard jumped out in front of me.
the piece should read.
Many women are short, to short to see over the steering wheel or reach the pedals of their 4x4,s without having a booster cushion. Do a survey on that one, just go to any school at home time and watch them.
Nobody has ever explained just how a BMI of over 30 was arrived at as being the limit of being healthy, why not a BMI of 25 or 35? Is this just another example "pick an average figure then knock a bit off" and so the control freaks can hector the majority of people to do as you say.
By the way, most of the England Rugby Team have a BMI of over 30. Anybody want to tell them they are big, fat, lazy lumps who should be out exercising? Any volunteers because I'll provide their running shoes and hold their coats!
To the guy wondering where BMI levels were derived from. It was the American insurance companies who did studies on people to see if they were more likely to contract illnesses if they were fat. They discovered that the fatter people became the more likely they were to end up with type two diabetes, heart disease and gall bladder disease in later life. Yep you’re right about rugby player ‘in their prime’ they have high BMI’s but are fit (unfortunately it all goes down hill when they get older and usually end up fat) and actually the service station checks looked at muscle mass as well as fat mass……….sadly few turned out to have a high BMI down to their muscle mass…………….keep on trucking……………
In response to The Bobelesque, In The Rye interestingly enough I don’t do this for commercial gain and have no affiliation with slimming products (all these checks are free to anyone taking part with funds raised from a variety of sources) I really don’t mind what people do with their lives and am only raising awareness to give people a choice. It’s amazing as a nurse of 34years how many people at their death beds say ‘if only I’d have know’…………keep on burying your heads it’s no skin off my nose