It’s an interesting policy idea on how to beat the obesity epidemic. Just make it illegal to be overweight.
You might smirk at the idea as unrealistic – but in a world where 500 million people are obese one county has done just that.
Pack on the pounds – into the slammer!
(Well not quite…)
In Japan, lawmakers passed what’s now known as the “metabo law” in 2008.
It is not a country you normally associate with obesity. In fact, the OECD ranks Japan with only 3% population obesity – one of the least obese developed countries.
Compare this with Australia that has around 60% of Australian adults classified as overweight or obese. More than 25% of these fell into the obese category – that’s 3.3 million Australians.
But a growing concern in Japan over the spiralling health costs of an ageing population – which would only be greater if afflicted by metabolic syndrome – caused the Government to act.
Metabolic syndrome is a combination of such symptoms as problems with cholesterol and triglycerides, high blood pressure and high blood sugar. It is likely to eventually lead to a stroke, heart attack and diabetes.
The Japanese policy, called ‘Metabo law’ is, in theory, simple – stay below a government-mandated waistline or face the consequences.
Top Comments
And this is why I left Japan. It's none of the government's business.
I've been doing some research on this an it seems to just be for corporate or businesses -
http://nihonscope.com/news-... - it's not really a fine or punishment for the individual and they're not really required to even get measured once a year, a lot of weirdness has circulated about this. The link mention explains it, it was written to talk a lot about the metabo law but it seems the author had to change his tune too after speaking with some people in Japan. Either way, if America had this, we'd be bankrupt in a flat second :P