Turkey Weighs Citizens in Public as Erdoğan Launches National Slimming Campaign

In a controversial new initiative, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has launched a nationwide campaign to combat obesity by weighing citizens in public spaces. The program, which began on May tenth, sends inspectors with scales to parks, bus stops, and even stadium entrances to randomly weigh people as part of a push to "slim down the country"—both figuratively and literally.

Citizens with a Body Mass Index (BMI) over twenty-five—the threshold for being overweight—are referred to local health offices for weight-loss guidance and healthy lifestyle tips. Inspectors also record height and age to calculate BMI using the standard weight-to-height squared formula.

The campaign, titled “Know Your Weight, Live Healthy,” is set to run until July tenth and aims to screen around ten million people—about one in eight citizens—across all eighty-one provinces in Turkey.

The initiative comes in response to concerning health statistics. According to the World Health Organization, around thirty percent of Turks are obese—nearly double the European Union average of seventeen percent and significantly higher than Germany’s rate of nineteen percent.

While Erdoğan frames the campaign as a public health necessity, it has sparked widespread backlash, especially on social media. Critics call it degrading and a violation of personal dignity, with some questioning whether participation is voluntary or mandatory. Others see the move as another step toward increasing government control over private life in Turkey.