Six out of seven people with hypertension ( 85 percent ) are overweight with a body mass index ( BMI ) exceeding 25 according to a report from the Government Office for Science in England.

Two-thirds ( 66 percent ) of hypertension is due to excess weight according to a report from the Government Office for Science in England.

Obesity increase the risk of hypertension 5-fold according to a report from the Government Office for Science in England.

Habitual snoring is associated with a 50 percent greater risk of developing hypertension during the next two years according to a new study from researchers at Korea University in Seoul, Korea.

A 22 pound weight loss reduces blood pressure an average of 6.0 / 4.6 mmHg according to a new study from the University of Aberdeen in Aberdeen, United Kingdom.

A weight loss of 22 pounds induced by lifestyle changes lowers systolic blood pressure an average of 7 points, and diastolic blood pressure 3 points according to a 1987 meta-analysis of five studies of hypertensive patients. (p. 29)

Hypertension is 2.1 more common in men and 1.9 times more common in women with a BMI of 30 or more compared to those with a BMI of 25 or less according to the U.S. NIH’s Obesity Guidelines (p. 12).

Hypertension is twice as common in people who are obese as people of normal weight and 30-50 percent less likely to be controlled according to a new study.

Obesity is undiagnosed in 22.9 percent of U.S. adults according to a new study.

In women, each 10 pound weight gain increases the risk of hypertension by 20 percent according to a recent study.

Abdominal obesity increases the risk of elevated blood pressure by 44-98 percent in men, and 104-198 percent in women according to a new study. 

Diet plus exercise is better at lowering blood pressure, but diet alone causes slightly more weight loss according to a study of overweight people with high blood pressure and metabolic syndrome (Syndrome X).

Extreme obesity, that is having a body mass index of 40 or more, increases the risk of high blood pressure 6.4-fold as self-reported by people who were surveyed according to a paper from researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

$4.1 billion according to the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. This is 17 percent of the total cost of hypertension.

In men, hypertension is present in

• 15 percent of men with a body mass index (BMI) of less than 25 (normal weight),
• 22 percent of men with a body mass index (BMI) of 25-27, and
• 27 percent of men with a BMI of 27-30.

In women, hypertension is present in

• 15 percent of women with a BMI of less than 25,
• 28 percent of women with a BMI of 25-27, and
• 33 percent of women with a BMI of 27-30.

Rabbits given the antihypertensive drug hydralazine ate less, weighed less, and had a lower percent bodyfat according to a study from researchers at the University of North Texas Health in Fort Worth.

HYPERTENSION was 8.5 times as prevalent in overweight adolescents as in their lean peers according to a recent study. 

In his interview, William Wilson, M.D., discussed a condition he has named Hypothalamic Pituitary Dysfunction, or HPD for short. In this article he provides an outline for diagnosis, treatment and examples of patients he has treated.

Losing 5 pounds decreases diastolic pressure by 7 mmHg and losing 10 pounds reduced it by 11.6 mmHg according to a study by McCarron and Reusser (1996).

“Clinicians are likely to encounter morbidity more frequently among their patients with elevated BMI, even those patients in the overweight category [with a body mass index greater than 25],” concludes a recent study by researchers from Tufts University, Harvard School of Public Health, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Systolic blood pressure is 9 mm Hg higher in obese men than in normal-weight men according to an analysis of 1029 men participating in the Baltimore Longitudinal Study of Baltimore. 

“Much of the worry about blood pressure--especially the ‘lower is better’--is false,” says mathematics and statistics professor Sidney S. Port from the University of California, Los Angeles. Prof. Port is the lead author of an excellent, ground-breaking, landmark, paradigm-shifting paper about the risks associated with systolic blood pressure that was published The Lancet in 2000. 

Artemis P. Simopoulos, M.D. is one of the world’s leading experts on the effects of essential fatty acids on health and disease and is the author of “The Omega Diet”.