Leaders of 70 health organisations have signed an open letter to Liz Truss urging the Prime Minister not to backtrack on plans for a clampdown on HFSS food promotions.
Last week it emerged the Treasury was carrying out a review of measures in the government’s obesity strategy amid fears they will further force up food prices and heap costs on companies already battling inflation.
Health charities, medical organisations and professionals, including the British Medical Association, British Heart Foundation and Cancer Research UK, were among those to express “profound concern” that the measures could be abandoned without facing parliamentary scrutiny.
The letter from the Obesity Health Alliance urges the new PM to reconsider any plans to weaken the public health measures put into place, which it points out were supported by three previous Conservative government leaderships.
It also highlights a survey carried out by last week by YouGov for Cancer Research UK of more than 2,000 adults, which showed 60% of people support the junk food restrictions being implemented as planned.
Last week’s development sparked speculation the government may halt the rollout of measures to ban HFSS promotions in prominent locations in stores, due to come into force next month, as well as scrap plans for a ban on multibuy promotions, already delayed until next year.
The Treasury was also said to be considering scrapping calorie counts on menus in cafés, takeaways, and restaurants as well as plans for a junk food advertising watershed on TV and an online ban.
It has also cast doubt over the future of the soft drinks levy introduced in 2018.
“It’s deeply disappointing to see the new government threaten to throw away the progress we have made tackling obesity without any evidence it would do anything to help alleviate the impact of the cost of living crisis,” said Dr David Strain, British Medical Association Board of Science chair.
“This sort of short-term thinking threatens not only the government’s target to halve childhood obesity by 2030 but the NHS itself, as obesity-related preventable illnesses mount up in the absence of any discernible strategy to prevent them.”
Dr Charmaine Griffiths, chief executive of the British Heart Foundation said: “If these rumoured reversals to vital obesity policies turn out to be true, then this represents a dangerous step backwards in addressing a major public health crisis.”
Chris Askew, chief executive at Diabetes UK, said it would be “totally reckless” for the government to backtrack on evidence-based policies designed to help people live healthier lives.
No comments yet