Fight Aging!

Visceral fat is strongly associated with most common age-related conditions and frailties, and mice have been shown to live longer if you remove their visceral fat. Maintaining excess fat tissue appears to be bad for you in many ways: more disability, more disease, a shorter life expectancy. So it's no surprise to see research results like this:

Visceral, or deep belly, obesity is a risk factor for bone loss and decreased bone strength in men. [Not] all body fat is the same. Subcutaneous fat lies just below the skin, and visceral or intra-abdominal fat is located deep under the muscle tissue in the abdominal cavity. Genetics, diet and exercise are all contributors to the level of visceral fat that is stored in the body. Excess visceral fat is considered particularly dangerous, because in previous studies it has been associated with increased risk for heart disease.

[Researchers] evaluated 35 obese men with a mean age of 34 and a mean body mass index (BMI) of 36.5. The men underwent CT of the abdomen and thigh to assess fat and muscle mass, as well as very high resolution CT of the forearm and a technique called finite element analysis (FEA), in order to assess bone strength and predict fracture risk. ... FEA can determine where a structure will bend or break and the amount of force necessary to make the material break.

In the study, the FEA analysis showed that men with higher visceral and total abdominal fat had lower failure load and stiffness, two measures of bone strength, compared to those with less visceral and abdominal fat. There was no association found between age or total BMI and bone mechanical properties. "We were not surprised by our results that abdominal and visceral fat are detrimental to bone strength in obese men. We were, however, surprised that obese men with a lot of visceral fat had significantly decreased bone strength compared to obese men with low visceral fat but similar BMI."

Link: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2012-11/rson-mwb111612.php