A new study in Acta Psychologica finds that South Korea’s new law requiring mobile games to disclose loot box probabilities is more effective than industry self-regulation.

Researchers Leon Y. Xiao (City University of Hong Kong & beClaws.org) and Solip Park (Aalto University) analyzed the 100 top-grossing iPhone games in South Korea.

They found that:

• 90% of games included paid loot boxes.
• 84% of games with loot boxes disclosed probabilities—compared to just 35% in the Netherlands and 64% in the UK.
• Only 41% of disclosures were easy to find, meaning many players may fail to access the information and remain confused or uninformed.

South Korean regulators have backed the law with active enforcement, identifying noncompliance and forcing companies to fix mistakes. Separately, fines were levied against major South Korean publishers like Nexon for misleading disclosures.

“South Korea is showing the world that loot box regulation can work—but only when actively enforced,” said Xiao. “Industry self-regulation has failed globally. If governments really want to protect players, we need enforceable laws with real penalties.”

The authors call on other countries to follow South Korea’s lead in actively enforcing video game regulations, but also to strengthen standards so that disclosures are clear, accessible, and independently evaluated for accuracy.

For most people, though, “if results are strong, maybe you don’t need another scan for five years,” says Wagner. “If they’re lower, lifestyle interventions can help, and you may want to recheck in a year.”

Radiation exposure is negligible, less than a chest x-ray. But the psychological impact can be more complicated. For some, the numbers motivate: “When I did a body composition test at 36, I had way more body fat than I expected,” Cheema says. “That pushed me to change my workouts and eating patterns in ways that improved my health—something BMI alone wouldn’t have prompted.”

For others, especially those with histories of disordered eating or body image issues, it can be destabilizing and overwhelming. Numbers can become another metric to obsess over rather than a tool for health. “It can be overwhelming if you don’t have a clinician to interpret the results,” Gidwani says. “That’s why I review all of my patients’ scans with them.”

Cheema agrees: “Too much detail without guidance risks overwhelming people with information that isn’t clinically actionable.”

“I don’t think DEXA gives too much information compared to, say, a whole-body MRI, which can reveal incidental findings that can cause anxiety and lead to unnecessary interventions,” says Gidwani. “Its data points are actionable: decrease body fat, reduce visceral fat, increase muscle.”

Experts emphasize that actionability is key. “The most important metrics are visceral adipose tissue and total body fat percentage, especially when tracked over time,” Cheema says. “But DEXA also breaks things down by arms, legs, trunk, etc. That can veer into aesthetics rather than health.

Should You Get One?

If you’re 65 or older, or at risk for osteoporosis, your doctor may already recommend a DEXA scan for bone health. For women in perimenopause, when bone density can drop by as much as 20 percent, an early baseline scan could flag risks years before they become urgent.

DEXA also detects sarcopenic obesity, where muscle loss occurs alongside high body fat. “Someone may look normal weight on a scale, but a DEXA can reveal poor muscle-to-fat balance,” Gidwani says.

Beyond those groups, the use case narrows. Athletes, bodybuilders, and people on GLP-1 medications may find the data genuinely useful. For generally healthy adults who exercise, eat decently, and check in with a doctor, many clinicians are indifferent.

“For a healthy individual, I wouldn’t universally recommend it,” Cheema says. “Lifestyle changes and basic care may matter more than getting a DEXA.” There are alternatives—bioimpedance scales, Bod Pods, and AI-enabled wearables—but none are as accurate as DEXA. For now, it remains the most precise, if expensive, tool available.

Final Takeaways

My DEXA results were somewhat humbling. Despite near-daily workouts and a decent diet, the scan flagged more body fat than I expected and the beginnings of osteopenia in my spine. The bright side was an “excellent” visceral fat score, something I’ll be bragging about indefinitely.

Catching early bone loss feels actionable; I can tweak my workouts to prioritize strength and mobility. But the body fat percentages have lived in my brain rent-free ever since, without offering much in return. I don’t plan to shell out a few hundred dollars for another scan anytime soon, so I may never know if my adjustments are actually working.

That’s the paradox of DEXA. For those with medical risks, it can be invaluable. For athletes chasing marginal gains, it’s another knob to turn. But for the rest of us, it’s a reminder that data is only as useful as what you’re willing or able to do with it. In the end, DEXA doesn’t promise longevity so much as it promises numbers, and numbers alone don’t add years to your life.

Meet the Experts

• Jennifer Wagner, MD, MS, chief health and performance officer, Canyon Ranch in Tucson, Arizona.
• Josh Cheema, MD, medical director of Northwestern Medicine Human Longevity Clinic in Chicago, Illinois.
• Pooja Gidwani, MD, MBA, board-certified physician in internal medicine and obesity medicine in Los Angeles, California.

Malaysia’s verdant, river-crossed state of Sarawak is charging ahead with plans to become a regional “green battery,” but its renewable energy dreams could come at serious environmental cost, experts warn.

Wedged between peninsular Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore and the Philippines, Sarawak’s leadership believes it could become a keystone in a regional energy transition.

Its many rivers and streams offer potentially abundant hydro-electricity and could one day power production of green hydrogen.

It is also installing solar and touting biomass to grow its renewable capacity, with Premier Abang Johari Tun Openg telling investors in Europe last week the state is “committed to a low-carbon and sustainable energy future.”

But environmental groups warn much of this green energy infrastructure contributes to deforestation and the displacement of Indigenous groups.

And for now, Sarawak’s main export is a fossil fuel: liquefied natural gas.

Harnessing hydro power

Sarawak began generating hydroelectricity several decades ago, and is currently building a fourth hydro-power plant.

They currently account for around 3,500 megawatts—enough to light about two to three million Southeast Asian households daily.

Its first floating solar field is already producing around 50 megawatts, and more than a dozen others are planned, Chen Shiun, senior vice president of Sarawak Energy Corporation, told AFP.

With a population of fewer than three million, the huge potential energy surplus is obvious, he said.

By 2030, Sarawak aims to generate around 10,000 megawatts, mostly from hydropower, with solar and natural gas contributing.

It wants to supply neighboring Sabah state and Brunei, and potentially mainland Malaysia, Singapore and the Philippines.

The state’s ambitions are “bold and promising,” and send “a strong signal for accelerating the region’s energy transition,” Shabrina Nadhila, an Asia analyst at energy think-tank Ember, told AFP.

‘Good example’

Southeast Asia’s power demands have more than doubled in the last decade, and will only grow further as the expanding middle class installs air conditioning and energy-hungry data centers emerge.

Kuala Lumpur is hoping the growing demand will re-energize a long-mooted electricity grid connecting members of the 10-country Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

“Sarawak is a good example that we can learn from, especially when we talk about the APG (ASEAN Power Grid),” top Malaysian energy official Zaidi Mohd Karli told AFP.

Already, a 128-kilometer (80-mile) cross-border electricity connection is bringing hydropower from Sarawak to neighboring Indonesia.

The state is also learning from other ASEAN countries such as Laos, which launched a similar hydro-powered plan in February, aiming to exchange around 1,500 megawatts of electricity with China by next year.

Environmental fears

But the state’s grand aspirations remain dogged by environmental concerns over the destruction of ancient tropical rainforests for hydropower construction and timber logging.

“Although Sarawak has the lowest emissions grade factor by far of any state in Malaysia, it also has the largest rate of deforestation,” Adam Farhan, of environmental watchdog RimbaWatch, told AFP.

“A large part of that can be attributed to hydropower.”

More than 9,000 Indigenous people were relocated from Bakun to make space for one of Southeast Asia’s largest dams, commissioned in 2011.

Almost 70,000 hectares—an area about the size of Singapore—of forest ecosystem was flooded, according to several environmental organizations and academic studies.

Relocation and compensation issues continue even today and there are fears of repeat scenarios and exclusion of local communities as new hydropower projects launch elsewhere, environmental groups said.

“The expansion of large hydropower infrastructure in Sarawak raises important environmental and social concerns,” Ember’s Nadhila said.

“To address these challenges, it is crucial to enforce strict and comprehensive environmental and social safeguards,” she warned.

Farhan from RimbaWatch added, “Sarawak needs to do a lot more to sort out its Indigenous rights issues and its deforestation issues before I think it could call itself a ‘green battery’ for Southeast Asia.”

© 2025 AFP