Are obesity, fat distribution, and weight gain risk factors for clinical diabetes in men?
Attained BMI is the dominant risk factor for developing type 2 diabetes in men, and waist circumference is a superior indicator of risk compared to waist-to-hip ratio.
These data suggest that waist circumference may be a better indicator than WHR of the relationship between abdominal adiposity and risk of diabetes. Although early obesity, absolute weight gain throughout adulthood, and waist circumference were good predictors of diabetes, attained BMI was the dominant risk factor for NIDDM; even men of average relative weight had significantly elevated RRs.
Chan et al. (1994) studied this question.