On 15 July, the Health Select Committee published a report, Food and Weight Management: Fixing the food environment which included a series of recommendations to UK Government about further restrictions to be placed on the UK advertising industry.
A spokesperson from the Advertising Association said:
This report represents a significant missed opportunity to put forward policies which would bring together government, industry, and the third sector to tackle this major policy issue.
Decades of research across multiple academic disciplines has repeatedly shown that advertising does not contribute to long-term changes in obesity or BMI and that advertising restrictions do not improve the nation’s health. This was proven once again by Professor Charles R. Taylor in his March 2026 essay, Does advertising cause childhood obesity? The consistent conclusion across hundreds of studies, large-scale reviews and meta-analyses is that advertising restrictions have limited or no causal effect on either long-term childhood obesity or BMI, while positive public health campaigns have proven benefits. The focus should be on addressing the real drivers of poor health including inequality, affordability, and accessibility of healthy food.
Industry has listened to the evidence about what works when it comes to advertising which is why it has invested millions of pounds into positive health campaigns like Eat Them to Defeat Them. We would strongly welcome working with the Government to move the conversation away from poorly evidenced policies that are ineffective and damaging to business and jobs, and onto a positive, collaborative approach that really will deliver healthy outcomes across the UK.
