Hint at Government food advertising crackdown
The forthcoming white paper on public health may propose restrictions on food advertising aimed at children, the Chief Medical Officer, Sir Liam Donaldson, said today.
So much unhealthy food was being promoted on children’s television that legislation should at least be considered, he said – but added that neither the content nor the date of the white paper had been fixed.
Speaking to the National Obesity Forum’s annual meeting in London, Sir Liam noted that 40 per cent of the advertising on children’s television was promoting food – and 70 per cent of that was for food high in sugar, salt or fat.
He said: “It leads us to challenge whether that is right and whether it is appropriate… and whether it requires legislation.”
The Chief Medical Officer warned that Britain could soon follow the Americas – where 33 per cent of school children were either overweight or obese. Some ten per cent of children worldwide were obese, while for Europeans the figure was 20 per cent.
He called for a “multi-stranded” campaign that would involve everyone from community groups to central government.
“It’s about going broad and deep – from encouraging greater uptake of breastfeeding to looking at food supplies globally,” he said.
On that note, he was heartened by an “unprecedented” level of interest in public health across departments other than the Department of Health – which he said was “just one player” in the fight against obesity.
The Department had to reorient itself and go “upstream” to act preventatively, ensuring that the focus was on health just as much on care, he said. And in its public health campaigns, it needed to make greater use of people’s life stories – “faces and names” – alongside statistics.
In closing, Sir Liam criticised those who polarised the debate by dubbing any Government attempt to change people’s lifestyles as ‘nannying’ or interference. Saying that fighting obesity was purely a matter for individuals was “absolute nonsense”, he said.
