Posts

Skipping a trip to the grocery store may lead to fewer junk food purchases

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CNN 

Study participants who ordered their groceries online spent less money on junk food compared to when they shopped in person, according to a study in the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior. Lead study author Laura Zatz, a senior adviser at The Behavioural Insights Team, said “Online shopping allows shoppers to avoid abundant in-store marketing and enticing food stimuli, which encourages us to add items to our basket that we didn’t plan to purchase,” she said. Read more…

What is driving Australians’ unhealthy food habits

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Medical Xpress

A new online tool brings together the best available data to describe Australia’s food environments, providing a clear picture of the ways that environment drives people, including children, to consume too many of the wrong types of foods. Australian children see more than twice as many ads for unhealthy food compared to healthy food on TV. And when kids are on their mobile devices, they are hit with as many as ten unhealthy foods and drink ads every hour. Read more

You can find the dashboard at https://foodenvironmentdashboard.com.au

Study exposes cognitive vulnerabilities to soft drink advertisements

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News Medical Life Sciences 
A new study from Flinders University, published in Appetite, found participants who found it difficult to resist sweet drinks compared to non-sweetened control beverages (e.g., water) – were more responsive to the ads than those without these tendencies. The Australian study compared the ability of 127 university-age students (18-25 year olds) to withstand or succumb to the urge to reach for a soft drink when viewing television advertisements. Read more

Fears junk food regulation chilled by free trade agreements

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Stuff NZ 

International free-trade agreements threaten to put a “chill” on junk food regulations, experts in NZ say as efforts to combat child obesity have stalled. Global obesity expert Boyd Swinburn, a professor of population nutrition and global health at the University of Auckland, said the trade agreements came through a “very undemocratic, non-transparent process”, and that the law needed to be strengthened so that public health was not badly affected by free-trade agreements. Read more

What Are We Feeding Our Kids? review – junk food exposé will leave you queasy 

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The Guardian

In What Are We Feeding Our Kids?, Dr. Chris van Tulleken looks into the health effects – particularly for children – of the increasing consumption of ultra-processed food. It costs twice as much to get 100 calories from fresh fruit, vegetables and fish in the UK as it does to get them from readymade food.  Tim Rycroft, the chief operating officer of the Food and Drink Federation, gives the standard line about needing to ensure people are empowered to make “good choices”. Van Tulleken pushes back about how much choice there is in an environment where everything – availability, price, marketing and so on – is designed to push the consumer one way. Read more

Junk food ads don’t just harm children’s health—they also infringe on their online privacy

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The Counter 

Public health advocates have long criticized ads for unhealthy food as harmful to children’s health, but a new report by the Center for Digital Democracy, a nonprofit that advocates for stricter regulation of tech companies, makes the case that they may also infringe on kids’ privacy. “Global giants in the food and beverage industry are working together with leading tech companies to ensure that unhealthy brands and products are woven into the media and cultural experiences that dominate the lives of young people,” reads the report. Read more …

 

 

Queen’s Speech 2021: Junk food adverts to be banned completely online and on TV before 9pm

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iNews

In the UK junk food adverts before 9 pm are set to be banned on television, along with a total ban online. The proposal was revealed in a briefing document that accompanied the Queen’s Speech, as she officially reopened the UK Parliament. Her Majesty announced that the Government would put the National Health Service at the forefront of the recovery from the coronavirus pandemic and, as part of that, introduce measures to tackle obesity. Read more …

MPP Gélinas junk food bill would remove tasty treats from cash checkout areas

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Toronto Star 

Ontario Nickel Belt New Democrat MPP and official opposition health critic France Gélinas has introduced a bill at Queen’s Park to remove the tempting racks of junk food and other treats with high fat, high sugar and high sodium content that are often located near cash register checkouts. A news release from Gélinas’ office said the bill is called the Temptation Be Gone Act and allows the government to make regulations that restrict the sales and marketing of certain treats — including restrictions on what can be located right next to the cash register. Read more

Are Junk Food Companies Using TikTok Influencers to Target Kids?

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Civil Eats
“There is a significant body of research showing that children are more vulnerable to advertising when it is integrated into content. The fact that children who spend hours a day on YouTube and TikTok feel like they have relationships with influencers makes these junk food pitches even more powerful,” said Josh Golin, executive director of the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood. He also sees disclosures such as an #ad hashtag as meaningless to children. “The FTC should instead prohibit influencer marketing aimed at children as an unfair practice,” he said. Read more

Are high-sugar adverts contributing to obesity in Mediterranean countries?

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FoodNavigator. Com 

The Spanish food industry is promoting unhealthy products for breakfast, according to Mireia Montaña Blasco from the Open University of Catalonia, who has undertaken research in response to rising obesity rates in Mediterranean countries. In total, the researcher analyzed 355 advertisements from 117 different products that appeared across Spanish media including the internet, television, radio, print and outdoor advertising.  Among the findings was that a vast majority of those targeted at children had an average sugar content of 36.2% compared to 10.25% for those targeted at adults. In Spain one in three children are overweight and the country has the highest proportion of childhood obesity in Europe. Read more