The great war against the big-bellied is well under way in China, with certain uni students at a hall of residence told to bed down in the bottom bunks to avoid potential damage caused by falling fatties.

Young scholars at the Hohai University, Changzhou campus in Jiangsu Province with a Body Mass Index of 28 or above or who are taller than 185 centimetres will need to stick to the ruling.

“Plump students find it difficult to get in and out of bed, especially the narrow upper bunks,” an employee at the education institution told Chinese newspaper Global Times.

Around 100 pupils are impacted by the policy that is designed to “avoid potential safety hazards” and minimise “conflicts among roommates”.

People with a BMI of 25 to 29.9 are classified as overweight, those with 30 to 39.9 are obese and 40 and above are branded severely or morbidly obese.

Obesity in China is seen as a substantial and expanding concern, according to the World Health Organisation. Across the country, around five per cent of the populace is considered overweight but the issue is more concentrated in cities where fast food outlets have sprung up.

Closer to home, the NHS is reviewing a proposed money-saving restriction that would have seen non-life-threatening procedures held back for 12 months for smokers and for chunksters with a BMI of 30 and over.

NHS Vale of York Clinical Commissioning Group will need to rethink the measure, NHS England said on 2 September. ®