Japan Imposes "Fine On Fat" 1271
An anonymous reader writes "A recently-introduced law in Japan requires all businesses to have mandatory obesity checks (video link) for all their employees and employees' family members over the age of 40, CNN reports. If the employee or family member is deemed obese, and does not lose the extra fat soon, their employer faces large fines. The legislated upper limit for the waistline is 33.5" for men, and 35.5" for women. Should America adopt universal health insurance, could we live to see the same kind of individual health regulations imposed on us by the government? By comparison, the average waistline in America in 2005 was 39 inches for men, 37 inches for women."
Foreign workers? (Score:5, Interesting)
Does this apply to foreign workers? For instance, if I were to go work in Japan for a year or two after I'm 40, would my employer be fined if I didn't shrink my 37 to a 33.5?
Re:wow.. seriously? (Score:1, Interesting)
Yeah, true. But even for people that are very obese, do we really want the government involved. I personally don't want the government involved in this sort of thing.
Weird if it's true. (Score:5, Interesting)
How can you have a single upper-limit on waist sizes? Are all people in Japan the same height or are short people allowed to be fatter than tall ones?
And how is the employer really responsible for their employees' weight? OK sure, there's going to be a bit of correllation between the general health attitude at your job and your own weight and from what I understand there's more of a culture for this thing in Japan but it still seems like a big leap to make in what a company is responsible for and subsequently what an employee has to answer to his employer about. Can constantly fat people be fired for costing their company too much in fines?
Re:One does not follow the other... (Score:3, Interesting)
It's only specious by your definition of "crazy", which conveniently excludes the extensive property and privacy rights violations that come with government-run healthcare (or government-run anything). You have no choice not to be part of the system. Don't want healthcare? Would rather keep your productivity and use it elsewhere? Don't want to pay for others' healthcare or have a committee determine how your money should best be used? "Too bad. Move if you don't like it" - that is the common response.
Re:One does not follow the other... (Score:5, Interesting)
I never understood why this was so unpopular. We tax the beejebus out of cigarretes because it is an easy way for politicians to raise taxes without making everyone mad. Eating tons of junk food over the course of your life isnt much better than smoking a pack a day.
I'm not saying I support a tax on junk food, but I cant see how people can support taxing lower income folks who go through a pack a day but not this.
Junk food tax? That's a GREAT idea. (Score:3, Interesting)
Increasing the cost of obesity reduces obesity. We don't know how much it would, but studies from cigarette taxes show that increases costs decrease consumption of even highly desirable things.
Obesity increases fuel consumption -- the obese eat more (more food transport and production fuel use) and weigh more (more transport costs in themselves). They eat 18% more, according the Lancet. The Lancet goes on to suggest that reducing obesity would reduce global warming.
And yes, their health care costs us -- we should be getting some of that back.
A small tax (in stores, vending machines and restaurants) on foods which digest quickly seems like a FANTASTIC idea. Not a big deal for someone that eats a few Snickers bars every month, but a noticeable pain for someone who eats them every day.
Interesting (Score:3, Interesting)
I was in japan about 9 years ago and I went back just a few months ago. I was amazed at the difference. There were far more people that I would categorize as overweight. No where near as many as in America and nobody that appeared to be obese, but it was quite a shift in a decade.
To go along with that I noticed that there were far more fast food places and unlike my first trip, restaurants did not list the calories on items the way they had in the past.
On the other hand I noticed that smoking was down and there were more non smoking areas (including on the streets of Tokyo) but those regulations were often ignored.
Athletes??? (Score:5, Interesting)
Hard to translate to America (Score:3, Interesting)
Americans are taller than the Japanese, and thus even relatively thinner people can have a larger waistline, and be considered fat. A better measurement, or goal might be percentage body fat or BMI (Cue the BMI holy wars of body builders).
Yes, obese people (and smokers) take more sick time, have more health expenses, lower productivity, etc. I'm a physician, and public health is one of the courses we take, so obesity and smoking related problems a are HUGE percentage of health dollars spent.
Now as far as BMI - it does not measure fat - let me repeat that- it DOES NOT measure fat, merely the relative weight to height. People in the ideal range tend to live longer. People outside the ideal range, be it fat or huge amounts of muscle, tend not to live as long (strain on the heart, kidneys, joints, etc).
I think it's only a matter of time before health insurance companies, and the government figure out that these obese people are not profitable/cost too much, and will penalize them accordingly.
In terms of public health, I think this is a good thing, as it will save a significant amount of money, and produce better health. I am also a big fan of free will, and independence, so if someone wants to be really fat, or smoke, then they should be able to - at a price.
Re:frosty piss. (Score:5, Interesting)
You'd have to send him to Japan first, which would be prohibitively expensive.
I'm more interested in what this does for Sumo wrestlers. Will they now be fired unless they go on a diet?
Re:already here (Score:5, Interesting)
Most countries with national health programs (mine included) don't have any restrictions on what you can do, eat, smoke, shoot up, jump off of or have sex with. As you point out, one country where the system does generally involve penalties for certain behaviour or conditions is the private system in the US.
Re:already here (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:already here (Score:3, Interesting)
At 6'2" you're about 5 inches taller than the average American or Brit. Remember that with averages everyone could be very close to the average or there could be very wide variance. My guess is that in Japan more people fall close to the average, while in the west there is far more variance. Therefore you won't experience the sea of heads all around the same height in the west even though our averages are close.
BMI (Score:5, Interesting)
Shaquille O'Neil is not exactly fat at 7'1" and 325, but he has a BMI of 31.6 -- well into the "obese" range. A 5'2" woman would have to weigh 173 pounds to have the same BMI as Shaq -- and I know damn well that 173 and 5'2 is rolling fat.
So tell us how useful the BMI is as a gauge of obesity again.
Re:wow.. seriously? (Score:3, Interesting)
Yeah, my spot on the BMI says I'm obese, I'm 6' & 250lbs. Except for the fact I go to the gym 3-5 times weekly, run 2-4 miles several times a week, and my actual body fat is around 14%, which is normal/slightly above average for those who are unfamiliar with the metric.
However, there are some really out of shape skinny people. It hardly seems fair that someone who starves themselves and does not exercise is considered to be in better shape than people who eat healthy and weigh more.
The only way to fairly measure fitness would be to administer some sort of physical readiness test like the military does. Being slightly overweight is healthy since you have reserves in case you get sick and should not necessarily count against you.
assume a round chicken (Score:3, Interesting)
Just some back of the napkin figures to ponder...
I know its Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] but the difference is not that great. About 172.8 cm average adult male for and 175.8 average adult male for US. This wikipedia article seems to be pretty well annotated.
Japan's diet is much improved since the post WWII days where the stereotype of Japanese being short was spread through US culture. They were shorter due to worse diet.
I have visited castles in Ireland, where my parents were born. Armor there looks like it was made for children, but Europeans in the middle ages were shorter, thanks to poor diet and disease.
A 3 cm diff in avg. Height comes to a little more than an inch. The average waste difference is 5.5 inches in TFA.
Now Humans tend to be taller than they are wide, so you would expect the variation in height to be larger than the variation in width. But the 33.5" to 39" difference is a circumference, not a width. a measurement around the waste should be directly compared to a measurement 'around the height" of the body. Measure foot to head, across the top of the head, back down from head to toe, and then across the bottom of the foot.
We can fudge this by doubling the difference in height and adding a little for the width of the body(a). Or by dividing the waste measurement by a little more than 2(b).
So (a)5.5" / 2.2 = 2.5" adjusted waste difference compare to a 1.2" height difference.
(b)1.2" x 2.2 = 2.64" adjusted height difference compare to waste difference of 5.5".
This brings the numbers a little closer, but still the waste differential is greater than the height using either fudge method.
Based on this data, it looks like Americans are carrying a little more around the middle than there Japanese counterparts.
Re:And your bad genetics cost ME... (Score:4, Interesting)
You say "good genes". I say: "bad math". Body fat is subject to the universal laws of thermodynamics. If you decrease your calorie consumption, you will have less energy left over to store as fat. The overall trend in the USA (or probably all of the western world) is towards unhealthy diets. I have what might be called a "superfood" diet and hover at a trim 30-32" waist size, even with what I must admit is too little exercise. I sport a six-pack and ripped muscles--its all diet. I'm down from about a 36" waist from when I realized I was getting too old for a 20-something diet full of pizza and cheeseburgers. Since beginning my superfood diet (approximately 50% of calories by fruit, 30% by legumes and nuts, 10% by grain, 10% by dairy), I have noticed that the healthy foods I choose have been systematically replaced in the grocery store by less healthy alternatives. For example, at my local Albertson's, whole grain cereals have been replaced by boxes of sugar-coated junk. "Regular" juice is replaced by "pulp free". Etc. Etc. Start a healthy diet and track the availability of the healthy foods you eat in the grocery store. You will see that your choices deteriorate over time. Soon you have to switch to "healthy" stores with elevated prices. Rather than tax employers, the state should tax unhealthy food alternatives. The cost of the unhealthy diet will be passed to the directly to the consumer where it belongs. To save money, people will switch to healthier alternatives that cost less. Right now, the most expensive foods in terms of cost per calorie, are the most healthy foods.
I know this one! Choice! (Score:4, Interesting)
You choose to have an unhealthy lifestyle, and thus there are incentives to encourage you to change.
Last I checked, I have very little control over my genetic code (still trying to invent that time machine so I can kill my father before I was born...)
That said, I'm rather unhappy that as a moderate consumer of alcohol, my insurance could group me with binge drinkers and charge me more money, even though there's evidence that moderate drinkers are healthier than non-drinkers [nih.gov]. Who gets to decide what's science and what's not?
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Interesting)
When I was in the Air Force in the early seventies, I worked with a weight lifter. This guy made Arnold Schwarzenegger look small; I doubt he had a single pound of body fat; all muscle and bone.
The AF instituted a "fat boy" program, you weren't allowed to be over a certain weight for a given height. Unfortunately for the weight lifter, muscle is denser than fat and he weighed too much!
The poor fellow was a career man and almost got thrown out of the military for being too fit. He finally passed his weight test by drinking coffee and beer all night, pissing out much of his water weight. Not healthy of course, but he got to stay in the AF.
Fine. But you cannot limit it to fat people only. (Score:4, Interesting)
If we are going to take this route, let's at least do it right.
The point is to penalize unhealthy people, correct? There are studies which show pretty conclusively that the healthiest people are the ones which are slightly over the 'ideal' weight. Folks carrying a bit of extra weight (read: normal) live longer than folks who maintain that beautiful body that TV insists you should have.
So, let's penalize the thin people too. If their lifestyle is as unhealthy as the fat folks, why exempt them?
Who's Libertarian??? Who's an anarchist??? (Score:3, Interesting)
"The article notes the Japanese law mandating obesity checks, and then goes off to claim that this is somehow related to universal health care."
No, the summary proposes the situation where the US is under universal healthcare (as Japan is), and then asks if we could see similar legislation. It does not assert that such would be the case. "But, instead of discussing this, you want to claim that government run "anything" is bad."
I did so in order to show why government-mandated waistlines are fundamentally bad. It was not a change in subject.
"it is easy to google and find out how badly that worked"
Can you provide some evidence yourself, or should we assume that it worked out badly?
"And you claim that you don't want police or a judicial system."
Where do I claim that? I am not an anarchist. The purpose of the government is to uphold the rights of the citizenry. This is done through the courts, police, and military. Ideally, their funding would be voluntary but their service would be universal.
Re:And your bad genetics cost ME... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Bullshit (Score:3, Interesting)
Try curing CAH. The symptoms right now, if you eat the required diet to keep the adrenal glands going, is to eat lots of high-cholesterol, high-electrolyte foods, which leads to weight gain. However, leaving the adrenals unchecked leads to other problems (heart problems) and throws off one's hormones, leading to weight gain. Today's western medicine treatments are to remove the adrenal glands (which, yes, you guessed it - lead to weight gain, and heart problems), or to take cortisol, which, yep! Taking that steroid leads to weight gain.
Me? I just started atkins. it's high enough in cholesterol that it should keep my adrenals happy, high enough in potassium and calcium (thanks to cheese!) and sodium to keep my electrolytes up, and the carbs down. Hopefully I'll be able to shed 50lbs.
But yes, there are glandular and hormonal issues which cannot be treated, or where the treatment causes more problems than the original symptoms.
But then, you probably know everything. ;)
Re:And your bad genetics cost ME... (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, I make these comparisons all the time, and I just don't see how the fast food places can charge so little, sometimes, except that they make up all their profit on fries and beverages.
For example, you can get 10 tacos at Taco Bell for like $9.00. Compare that to: buying the ground beef, lettuce, tomatoes, taco seasoning, shells, and cheese. And then add in the fact you don't have to cook or clean up when you go to Taco Bell.
Most restaurants seem to be losing money on the food, or breaking even, and making it up on the beverages. But if you're cheap and grab a bag to go without buying the extras, eating fast food (while I really don't recommend it) can be pretty cheap.
Now, the QUALITY of my tacos is better, but that's not the same question.
Re:And your bad genetics cost ME... (Score:4, Interesting)
The problem is time.
When you eat slowly, you tend to eat less.
When you're well rested, you tend to eat less.
When you cook meals to eat when you are hungry, instead of waiting until you are very hungry, you tend to eat less.
Cooking food takes time.
Cleaning up your dishes between meals takes time.
Cheap fresh produce doesn't stay edible as long as processed goods, so you have to shop more often. That takes time.
And of course, there's physical activity. An exercise routine (with a shower after each workout) takes time too. It's also harder to motivate yourself to exercise when you're dead tired.
Welcome to modern suburban America, where you work 55 hours a week, commute 12 hours a week, and then try to keep up with your yard work, your bills, your relationship with your spouse/significant other and children, and everything else in what time you have left. Home cooked meals with fresh healthy foods go out the window, and you're whipping up processed crap left and right and eating 900 calorie fast food meals.
I say all this as a guy who moved to the suburbs seven years ago, got fat, and now can't sell his house.
More seriously, the working poor with much longer work hours and often two or even three jobs have it much harder.
Re:And your bad genetics cost ME... (Score:3, Interesting)
And I find it's the other way round. In dollars per useful unit of protein, the low-carb, better quality foods tend to be cheaper. Meat is a much more concentrated protein source than bread; if you weight the price on cents per gram of protein, this becomes evident.
And [putting on 95% of a biochem degree hat] you are right, the key to long-term weight control *without abnormal hunger* is simply cut back carbs, and make your body revert to the biochemical behaviours it evolved for. When you get enough *balanced* protein AND fat, you won't crave all the substitute building blocks, either (ie. junk foods).
Re:And your bad genetics cost ME... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:And your bad genetics cost ME... (Score:4, Interesting)
"...one thing I noticed and found rather interesting was that overweight or otherwise unhealthy looking people usually bought the more expensive pre-made food while healthier people purchased instead a whole lot more of the items required to make their own food like flour and produce."
I've noticed the same thing. And it applies to meat as well. Butcher-cut meat that you actually have to cook yourself is bought by the lean and healthy; pre-packed pre-cooked meat-and-prepared-meal products are bought by the overweight.
I have friends who live almost entirely off "Lean Cuisine" and similar frozen diet meals. They don't eat a great deal (usually a small breakfast and one of these frozen diet meals per day) yet they are both overweight, and losing that battle. One of 'em also suffers from "chronic fatigue syndrome". Funny thing, whenever I stay at their house and eat what they do, I wake up the next day feeling tired and with no energy at all. Hmm...
Re:And your bad genetics cost ME... (Score:3, Interesting)
Anyway when I was in HS I was a long-distance runner. I wasn't terribly good at it but I ran at least a little every day. I'm 6'1" tall. When I graduated I weighed 155lbs and had a 3% bodyfat (not kidding). I was a lean SOB. I went to college and joined the marching band, toting around a 55lbs instrument 5 days a week plus game days. I lost 10lbs the first week, though I don't know where it came from. When I was in that kind of shape I could eat any food and up to any quantity I could stuff in my stomach. After track meets we would go to McD's and have an eating contest. I would put away $25-30 worth of food easy. A couple Big Macs meals "super-sized", milkshakes, fries, etc. A couple boxes of McNuggets. Toss on some doublequarter-pounders with cheese and an ice cream cone for the road. It never affected me. I also didn't drink pop in HS.
College was pretty much the same thing. Then came my first real job as a netadm. A sit down job. I packed on 30lbs within a few months' time. I wasn't gorging myself (couldn't afford to). I couldn't many of my meals. We ate out for lunch as a group. I really wasn't eating that much. So what changed? My metabolism. It dropped like a rock. It total I put on 90lbs after HS.
That was many years ago now. I've been fighting to get back into shape but it's hard. I still have a sit down job. I still cook most of my meals. I started drinking pop again in HS and abused it at that first job. Since then I've cut it down to maybe 1 glass a day with lunch. I drink iced tea during other times. I don't do coffee unless it's cold as hell. I work out doing cardio for at least 30m a day but I need to do more. I was doing weights until I hosed up my back muscles and spent a few quality hours in the ER. Last summer/fall I was going to the gym twice a day doing mainly cardio. I didn't drop much weight but I was starting to feel much better. I was very careful to avoid high concentrations of caffeine after workouts for at least a couple hours. Meaning I would still have some pop at lunch, though I would only let it be half a glass or so. I would drink tea at work. Yes, tea has caffeine in it but far less than pop or coffee. The reason behind the avoiding caffeine after working out is that caffeine causes your blood glucose levels to skyrocket. Your body burns off this glucose first instead of focusing on your fat cells, thus mitigating the benefits of working out.
Anyway, back to your point, yes weight can be caused by genetic attributes. Overall though if you can maintain your metabolism you can generally stiff-arm genetics.
Re:And your bad genetics cost ME... (Score:2, Interesting)
*sigh* I'm sure many /.ers don't care about my personal habits or med history, but I'll go ahead and answer this for the same reasons that you posted it: because anyone who comes along and reads it shouldn't go and do something stupid based on it.
Point 1: Exercise. I get quite a bit of exercise. Not only do I have my own routine of stretches (modified to fit personal issues, since my knees are already shot - from when I was 12 and bordering on underweight, BTW), but I also chase 2 kids under 5 around all day long. Also, in the middle of my stretches (which I work into my children's nap time) I attempt to do 10 each of situps, leg-lifts, and scissor leg-lifts. There have been times when my knees were just too shot and hurt too much to do it, but on the whole that's my daily routine. On top of that, we go swimming at least 2 times (some times as much as 5) a week. I can't do machines due to various troubles (ie my knees and the fact that I fractured my elbow not long ago and that shot doing anything with my arms until it heals - if it ever does), but I do attempt to squeeze in as much exercise as I can and get way more than 15 minutes a day. As far as building muscles goes - when discussing being "overweight" we are not talking necessarily about being just "fat", as I stated. I actually have really good muscular definition in my legs and arms (my abs... well, not so much, but I work on them).
Point 2: Diet. I hope that no one reading this post will ever take advice about a diet without consulting their doctor and assessing their own personal dietary needs. Case in point: My doctor has told me not to go on a high protein/low carb diet due to hypoglycemia. That being the opposite of diabetes, my body actually requires that I take in carbs to use up the extra insulin I produce. The one time I tried (stupidly) to go on a low carb diet, I got violently ill and could have ended up in a coma. That being said, I believe in the moderation diet. I eat when I am hungry (typically every 3-5 hours) and substitute every chance I get for healthy items. True, I'm not a saint, and I'm as vulnerable as the next person to the "sweet tooth" cravings, but I do my best and watch my caloric intake, which is what my doctor says I should do to remain healthy.
Also, it seems odd to me that you are advocating a diet which instructs you to "force" yourself to eat when almost everything I've ever heard says that that is really what the problem is - the fact that we don't listen to our bodies and only eat as much as we need to be "full" rather than "stuffed". But, if that is what worked for you, then more power to you. I guess the biggest thing that I think one should do is really make a DIET - which is different than what we use the word for today. If you are going to change the way you eat, it needs to not be for just a couple months (which, in all actuality, can make you more UN-healthy) but needs to be a conscious decision to alter your LIFE. To eat a salad full of greens instead of opting for the french fries. To bake up a chicken breast instead of fry up a hamburger. Does this mean you can never indulge occasionally, as most diets teach? No. This is merely a way to be healthy, and the rest should follow.
I guess my main point is, there are many different factors that go into a person's weight. Hormones, bone density, muscle mass all play a factor - without even getting into your diet or exercise routines. The idea that a government is going to make a blanket statement that if you are X tall you must weigh X in order to be healthy without taking anything else into account is, IMO, completely stupid. Rather, focus on getting your people HEALTHY without worrying so much about their WEIGHT - if they truly are overweight by their own body's standard, that will follow from getting healthy. And if we taught this, then maybe more people (especially women!) would feel better about themselves no matter their size or shape. If you exercise, eat right and take care of yourself b
Re:And your bad genetics cost ME... (Score:3, Interesting)
I'm beginning to realize a common misconception--I don't think most people realize that hunger is normal. If you don't believe me, go into a jungle, find a ripped, beautiful, healthy animal (like a tiger), and offer it some food from its natural diet. Know what its going to do? Its going to eat it--voraciously. Why? Because its hungry. Wild animals are *always* hungry because that's how it is in nature. Animals (and humans fit the biological definition of "animal") have evolved under conditions of hunger. Humans have found a way to overcome hunger by producing a calorie surplus for themselves so most find hunger uncomfortable. But it shouldn't be, especially if it is accompanied by healthy foods.
Re:And your bad genetics cost ME... (Score:3, Interesting)
Good points -- nature is largely about the daily grind of filling your stomach. A certain amount of hunger is normal in that context.
And "normal hunger" involves a certain amount of telling your stomach to STFU when it's complaining merely because it's empty -- which is NOT a good or reliable indicator of when your BODY is hungry. Learn to ignore the stomach and listen to your body instead. Eventually your stomach will learn to make only a token protest, then stop pestering you.
Until your stomach is trained to the fact that it's not in charge here, you can bribe it with a couple of crackers or a bit of jerky, but never fruit or sweets (fruit is mostly fructose and water, ie. sugar water), except for dates, which seem to work well as a stomach-bribe.