When it comes to gender equality, Japan has no shortage of distressing figures. The statistics that are most often used to illustrate the nation's dismal status in this respect are the United Nations Development Program's Gender Empowerment Measure (GEM), which gauges equality by tracking women's participation in politics and business.
Asia is in the grip of a diabetes epidemic. In human and financial terms, the burden is huge and it is hitting the poor especially hard. Often thought of as a disease of the rich, experts say the unabating rise may be fuelled as much by food scarcity and insecurity as it is by excess.
Changing lifestyles, rapid urbanisation and cheap calories in the form of processed foods are putting more and more people at risk of developing Type-2 diabetes.
There are now 382 million people worldwide living with diabetes, according to new figures from the International Diabetes Federation (IDF).
More than half are in Asia and the Western Pacific, where 90-95% of cases are classed as Type-2.
Lung cancer rates among women in the UK have risen by 73% since 1975, while falling by 47% among men. Cancer Research UK, which has released the figures, says the changes are because of contrasting trends in smoking habits in men and women. Lung cancer is a disease of affluence