Being overweight is a health hazard - but discrimination prevents such individuals from getting the assistance they badly need

Nearly 40 years of economic growth have liberated the majority of Chinese people from arduous physical labor. However, they still seem to have the irresistible craving for high-calorie food that they acquired during the long shortages of necessities, even famines, in the past. Because of this, many have become overweight or obese, posing a threat to their health.

The Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention warned in its recent report that expanding waistlines are fast evolving into a major inducement for chronic disease.

The number of overweight individuals is higher in the northern part of China than in the south. Tianjin has the highest rate of overweight people (40.9 percent) among all provinces and regions, with the Tibet autonomous region (18.4 percent) having the lowest. Beijing has the highest rate of obesity (25.9 percent) in China, and Hainan province and the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region the lowest (5.7 percent), the center said in the report.

The impact of the obesity problem on the urban population is not only limited to health, but also has a bearing on other aspects of their social life. For example, in May, two key private primary schools in Shanghai said obese parents lower their children's chances of being successful in the fiercely competitive interviews for enrollment.

The policy, deemed unfair and discriminative by many, has, however, been supported by a larger number of people, who believe that a well-preserved figure represents quality of life, self-discipline and a strong sense of self-awareness, and parents with these qualities are more likely to be role models for their children, especially when it comes to their education.

This argument does not hold water, because it ignores the many and complicated causes that may lead to obesity. Besides, there is no reason to attribute obesity to laziness and voracity. Usually, three factors can be responsible for obesity: inheritance, environment and lifestyle, including habits. Obesity that stems from genetic factors cannot be controlled by the obese people alone.

Before implementing the enrollment policies, the two schools should at least differentiate between the different causes of obesity. That, however, would make the enrollment procedure very complicated and increasingly irrelevant to testing a child's learning capacity and potential.

Obesity, as a social problem, can be solved only through the efforts of the entire society. Entrenched prejudice and ignorance drives obese people toward self-abasement and recessive depression, which further estranges them from others and turns them into hopeless individuals.

A long-term study in Britain covering 5,400 volunteers over 50 years of age found that the chance of obese people, who feel discriminated against by society, trying to take up at least one physical exercise regime of moderate intensity is 66 percent lower than for individuals who are not obese.

The reason is that obese people care more about how other people perceive them and they don't want to become a focus of public attention, let alone a laughing stock, while doing physical exercise. Discriminative attention from people around them can deepen obese people's stereotypical belief that they are innately lazy and inactive, which ultimately boils down to self-abandonment.

It is necessary to raise public awareness to end discrimination and prejudice against obese people. Obesity should be seen as a social issue. China needs a more forgiving social environment to encourage obese people to take the initiative to lose weight through scientific methods, which would be conducive to improving public health as a whole.

The author is a columnist for China Youth Daily. The article was first published in CYD on July 5. The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.

(China Daily European Weekly 07/21/2017 page13)