The New Blood Pressure Guidelines

The blood pressure guidelines for “high blood pressure” have been lowered once again. As America get fatter and fatter, it’s interesting that the cutoffs for things like blood pressure and cholesterol levels get lower and lower, and drug sales go higher and higher.

New guidelines lower the threshold for high blood pressure, adding 30 million Americans to those who have the condition, which now plagues nearly half of U.S. adults.

High pressure, which for decades has been a top reading of at least 140 or a bottom one of 90, drops to 130 over 80 in advice announced Monday by a dozen medical groups.

I’m skeptical of these new blood pressure standards.  If the ultimate outcome – regardless of what people are saying now – is really going to be an emphasis on losing weight, exercise, and good diets, then fine.  But I believe that the real ultimate outcome is going to be putting half of America, or more, on blood pressure medication, just like we’ll have half on statins, and a big percentage on attention deficit disorder medication, all leading to fat profits for pharmaceutical companies.

So, yes, get your blood pressure to healthy levels. But the specter of folks with 30+ BMIs taking blood pressure medications and statins seems to be self-defeating.