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Height and size are often considered as prized genetically-determined biological assets. But a new study suggests that height is now an indicator of health risk to a number of serious conditions like cardiovascular diseases, cancer, and diabetes.

Featured in the online scientific journal The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology, the German-led study reveals that while height are generally influenced by genetic factors, today's calorie-rich and fat-laden foods are responsible for people's over-nutrition exposing them to greater likelihood of developing major non-communicable diseases later in their lives.

The published findings seem to link height with its influence on mortality regardless of body mass index (BMI) and other regulating factors.

"Accordingly, our new data show that tall people are more sensitive to insulin and have lower fat content in the liver, which may explain their lower risk for cardiovascular disease and Type-2 diabetes," remarked Norbert Stefan of University of Tubingen in Germany as quoted by Economic Times.

The inverse relation between height and risk of getting cardiovascular diseases and diabetes seems to benefit tall people. But it's not the case though when it comes to cancer mortality.

"Epidemiological data show that per 6.5 centimeters in height the risk of cardiovascular mortality decreases by six per cent, but cancer mortality, by contrast, increases by four per cent," said Matthias Schulze of the German Institute of Human Nutrition as mentioned in a report by the Daily Mail.

The German study wasn't the first one to establish a correlation between height and the risk of getting cancer. A previous Swedish-led study claimed that for every four inches of height is an 18% increase of cancer risk in women and 11% in men.

The German researchers, however, offered an "alternative explanation" for height's impact on cancer mortality risk.

"[It] could be that taller people simply have a larger number of cells in their bodies that then could potentially transform into cancer," the researchers wrote as mentioned in part by the Medical Daily.