While doctors are mobilized against Marisol Touraine’s health bill and in particular against the generalization of third-party payment, two amendments that have gone unnoticed so far should achieve consensus. They concern extreme thinness in modeling.
The PS deputy from Isère and neurologist Olivier Véran, wants to ban the presence of models at thebody mass index too low in model agencies. “It is intolerable that we can glorify undernutrition and that we can commercially exploit people who are in situations that endanger their health,” he explains.
To compel the professionals of the medium to respect standards of corpulence, the socialist pleads for a modification of the labor code which would force the agencies to request a medical certificate attesting to a normal BMI for each model. Violators of this obligation should pay a fine of 75,000 euros and/or six months’ imprisonment.
What would be the limit value of the BMI below which the model would be considered too thin? The member proposes a discussion on this point. “This value is not yet determined. It will have to be debated”. The High Authority of Health should have to decide.
Policy on this varies from country to country. In Spain, for example, the minimum BMI is 18.5. In Italy, it is around 18, “that is to say 55 kg for 1.75m”, specifies the deputy quoted by Le Parisien. And in France? “In France, we consider that we are thin below 18.5. The WHO retains an index below 18 to start talking about malnutrition. Below 17, it is severe malnutrition. Below of 16, it is considered a state of starvation”, continues the neurologist to AFP.
Against “the apology of anorexia” on the Internet
But modeling agencies are not the only ones singled out by the deputy. While 30,000 and 40,000 people suffer from anorexia nervosa in France, the neurologist at the Grenoble University Hospital wants to raise awareness, especially among adolescents. His second amendment aims to put an end to “the apology of anorexia”. It would establish a “crime of promoting excessive thinness” and would provide for the prohibition of Internet sites that “apologize for anorexia”.
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