Obesity isn’t just an American problem. We often think that we are the sole carrier of the torch, but it’s a global problem. Mexico, Argentina, Egypt, and Greece are only a few countries that have overweight rates (a BMI greater than or equal to 25) nearing the 70 percent mark, according to the World Health Organization.

Japan isn’t just “the Land of the Rising Sun”… but health care costs as well. The country is taking extreme measures to curtail expenses. The thing that is confusing is they are near the bottom of any list I see ranking overweight countries (by BMI). They are 163rd on the World Health Organization’s list of overweight (22 percent of the population).

Nevertheless, Japan’s health care costs have ballooned by 68 percent between 1989 and 2006, to $370 billion a year. Without doing a thorough analysis of everything that may be causing this increase in cost, maybe 1 in 5 people being overweight is enough for government officials to take action.

.Reference resource: Click Here.

Tags: Health care, Obesity, Overweight

This entry was posted on March 29, 2011 at 10:41 pm and is filed under Japan Health. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.