The Metabo Law - Higher English PDF

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Tackling obesity – should the Metabo law be introduced in the UK? To be able to explore this issue more thoroughly, perhaps we need to start with the definition of precisely what is obesity? The state of being grossly fat or overweight. This definition, however, needs to be sharpened up to be useful to the medical practioner. The NHS uses a combination of Body Mass Index and waist circumference to calculate healthy weight and excess fat. We now turn to the size of the problem - adult obesity in England has risen from 15% in 1993 to 26% in 2016. Even more disturbingly, an NHS survey estimates that 28% of children aged 2 to 15 in England were overweight or obese in 2016. Looking at the trend in childhood overall, 32.4 percent of children are overweight or obese by the time they finish primary school. This is a marked increase from a 30 percent figure in 2006/7. No pun intended, but obesity is clearly a large and growing problem. The problems caused by obesity occur at both a personal and a population level. For the obese individual, life may offer a range of unpleasant outcomes including diabetes, heart disease and even some cancers. For the wider population, the outcomes include increasing demands on NHS staff and facilities and an estimated cost currently around £5.1 billion per annum. In 2016/17, there were 617 thousand admissions in NHS hospitals where obesity was a factor. This is an increase of 18 per cent on 2015/16. Evidently, obesity has hugely detrimental effects and, like smoking, needs urgent action both at a personal and a societal level. The magic bullets that were brought to bear on smoking included massive tax rises on cigarettes, major advertising of the ill effects of smoking and considerable effort by the NHS in preventative actions. It is clear that the effective reduction of obesity will require a similar commitment. It is my contention that one of the actions that should be undertaken in the UK is the introduction of the Japanese “Metabo law”. Japan – the country where being overweight is now illegal. Normally, Japan wouldn’t be the first country that comes to mind when thinking of obesity (in fact only 3% of its population comes under this category) however, already concerned over escalating health costs due to an ageing populace, the Japanese government were not going to risk being further burdened by the issue of excessive weight. Hence, the “Metabo law” was born. This law, in simple terms, requires citizens to stay below a stated waistline - 85cm for men and 90cm for women. Exceeding these limitations results in the individual being obligated to undertake therapy and treatment, including supervision through phone or email. In addition, fines may be levied on businesses exceeding a specific percentage of ‘fat’ employees. NEC, Japan’s largest manufacturer of computers, claims that it is possible to incur up to $19 million in penalties for breaching this target. This law is fairly simple in terms of complexity, and seems to work- considering that 97% of Japan’s population are at a healthy weight – so why couldn’t we move towards its introduction in the UK? Some may argue that the idea of a ‘fat law’ is both repressive and irrational. It could be said that we would be removing freedom of choice. However, encouraging people to take more

ownership of their own health, especially from a primary school age is not about curtailing freedom of choice, rather it is supporting people to aspire to a more healthy lifestyle. It is not my proposal to simply introduce the “Metabo law” overnight, but if we set a clear date for the start of the law then the necessary actions towards compliance will get a sense of urgency. The groundwork for the “Metabo law” should include making unhealthy food and drink products both harder to obtain and much more costly, exactly the same as was done with cigarettes over the years. Negative advertising of unhealthy products while accentuating the positives of healthy alternatives could be radically stepped up. Food manufacturers, like cigarette manufacturers will kick and scream and threaten legal action the first time that a bloated, diseased heart appears on a burger wrapper, however, they will fall into line. The NHS is likely to gratefully accept a greater public presence in providing health and wellbeing guidance in the knowledge that they will save billions as a result of this upfront investment. A powerful counter to the concept of the “Metabo law” is that we are trying to eliminate ‘unwanted’ members of society. The parallel to Jews wearing yellow stars under Nazi rule cannot be ignored. Neither, for that matter, can we neglect the parallel with the needs and demands of our fast ageing society. But, here’s the thing, the Jews were born Jews, nobody is immune to getting old, but, our obese adults have very largely been the architects of their own fate. This statement is not to apportion blame, it is to clarify that some or all of the damage could be undone by changing behaviour. Yes, some people have a genetic predisposition to put on weight, yes an even smaller number of people have medical eating disorders, but, the majority of obese people simply ate themselves into a corner. It’s not that we dislike them, although we would rather not sit next to them on a bus or plane, but, we feel that given the opportunity many obese people would change for the better. The proposed law sounds like and is tough love but until we can change the game for obese people, then today’s obese children will tread the same path into obese adults. In conclusion, how are we going to abolish the UK’s title as the sixth fattest nation in the world and reduce the high percentage of obesity related demises (now approximated as one in every eleven deaths)? It is plain that drastic measures are necessary – drastic for food companies, drastic for advertisers, drastic for the NHS and (very) tough love for the obese population. If we do all that, then introducing the “Metabo law” would and should be a formality....