Japan's New Fat Law... Should Canada Follow Suit?

So Japan has imposed a waist-line standard because it was concerned about the metabolic health of its country. Japanese lawmakers last year set a maximum waistline size for anyone age 40 and older: 85 centimeters (33.5 inches) for men and 90 centimeters (35.4 inches) for women.
This new law is called the "Metabo Law". This is an interesting move by the Japanese government but I am not sure it is the safest way to do it. I would assume that many Japanese citizens at the age of 40 are scrambling to come in under the required waistline size.
Apparently according to the Global Post many are using extreme measures in diet as well as popping herbal pills and fat loss remedies to get into the shape required. The good news is that many are also working out.

Unfortunately humans do not always make the best decisions even though we are supposed to be the most "intelligent" animals on the planet. I am not so sure! As we have witnessed with tobacco and alcohol, humans often abuse various substances. Today we see a lot of FOOD abuse. People are eating insane amounts and portion sizes around the world have increased.
The US in particular has an EXTREME obesity epidemic which then leads to a plethora of other diseases including DIABESITY. Unfortunately, Canada is not far behind

My thoughts are that we would never be able to pass a law like Japan so why not tax the hell out of fast-food, processed food, candy, POP/SODA. This way at least we could pump some money back into our already failing healthcare system.

Just my thoughts,

Cheers,

Bouncelife

Kids and Sports Drinks

Everywhere you go nowadays you see ads for energy and sports drinks and I often see kids of various ages walking to and from school with one of these types of drinks in their hands. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), children should not consume drinks that have stimulants in them to provide energy. Many of these drinks have as much caffeine as 2-3 cups of coffee. These drinks are choc full of sugar and the "sport" drinks are also full of carbs and electrolytes and both contribute cavities, weight gain and obesity. 

Most kids do not need sports drinks unless they are playing high intensity sports and even then the drinks should be diluted with water.

Water is still the king of drinks and should be the drink of choice for our kids.

Source: Pediatrics 127 (2011): 1182–89.

Cheers,

Bouncelife

Child Obesity

Today I want to talk a bit about "Child Obesity". We just recently returned from a cruise to the Caribbean and my wife and I could not believe how many overweight children there were on the ship. When watching these families almost every single one of these overweight children had one or both parents that were overweight.  If I were to do the BMI calculations on these children and their parents the outcome would surely be that they would actually fall into the "obese" (> 30 BMI) category according to their BMI results. These children when put in this position are extremely hard pressed to come out later in life at a healthy body weight.  In fact, they usually tend to trend towards even greater weight gain and have a higher propensity for diabetes and other diseases. Part of the challenge is that our children adopt our eating habits early in life and if we are not eating healthy and living a balanced lifestyle it is likely that our children are following suit. With obesity and diabetes on the rise around the world we really need to focus on our children to ensure that they adopt good habits and get a fair chance to lead a healthy, balanced life early on.
Here is an interesting article that outlines what we are discussing here: http://www.peoples-health.com/childhood_obesity_facts.htm 

Cheers,

bounce life