I’m fine, thank you. At least, that’s what I think. I have no major illnesses, I’m of average weight, and a recent knee scan showed that my joints are well lubricated. My blood pressure is normal, and I exercise pretty regularly — at least, sometimes. But I can’t stop coughing, and I don’t feel very strong physically. I’m turning 40, and given my family history of breast cancer, I should get a mammogram.
So am I healthy? As my “big birthday” approaches, I’ve been thinking more and more about this: what does it mean to be healthy, and how can I best measure it? I assumed there would be an established way to find out. But as I began to look, I quickly discovered that this is a surprisingly difficult question to answer.
One reason is that many of the metrics we rely on, such as BMI (body mass index), have been found to be flawed. But it’s also the result of new insights into things like the microbiome and immune system. These insights have given rise to a whole new set of tests that promise to more accurately measure health, from those that look at gut bacteria and metabolites to those that provide “immunity levels.” So which of these new tests should you rely on for the ultimate health check?
What does it mean to be healthy?
A common sense definition of what it means to be healthy probably goes something like this:
