Turkey has launched a controversial health initiative that sees citizens weighed and measured in public spaces as part of a sweeping campaign to tackle obesity.
The programme, which aims to assess the body mass index (BMI) of 10 million people by July 10, has sparked a fierce national debate over privacy, government overreach, and the economic realities that underpin public health.
While authorities insist the campaign is necessary to confront an obesity crisis, many Turks have voiced outrage over being stopped and assessed in town squares, parks, shopping centres—and even outside buses and football stadiums.
Health officials have been stationed across all 81 provinces, equipped with scales and tape measures, conducting impromptu BMI checks on passersby’s.
The government is promoting the campaign under the slogan “Know your weight, live healthy,” and views it as a crucial step in what it describes as a “national fight” against obesity.
Minister of Health Kemal Memişoğlu, speaking at a recent nursing conference, emphasised the seriousness of the issue: “50 percent of our society is overweight,” he said. “Being overweight means being sick, it means we will get sick in the future. Our young children are overweight, their body resistance is high and that’s why they don’t get sick, but when they start getting older, that weight will turn into joint and heart diseases.”
In a symbolic move, Memişoğlu himself was weighed in Ankara last week and found to be “above normal weight,” as classified by health officials. Photos circulating on social media show individuals being directed onto scales and having their height recorded before calculating their BMI.
The campaign, which launched on May 10, aims to reach one in eight Turkish citizens. Those whose BMI exceeds 25 are referred to state-funded Family Health Centres and Healthy Life Centres, where they are eligible for free nutritional advice and monitoring.
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However, public reaction has been far from favourable. Critics have questioned the intrusive nature of conducting weigh-ins in full view of others and argue that the initiative fails to take into account the economic pressures that make healthy eating difficult for many.
Rising food prices and stagnant wages have left large portions of the population struggling to afford nutritious food options.
The timing of the campaign has also raised eyebrows. The Turkish newspaper Evrensel noted that the initiative was introduced in the same week that a new generation of weight-loss injections became available in the country, calling the timing a “strange coincidence.”
BMI, a system first popularised in the 1970s, continues to be a widely used tool for assessing body fat. A BMI between 18.5 and 24.9 is generally considered healthy, while figures from 25 to 29.9 are classified as overweight.
A BMI over 30 is defined as obese.
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