Crackdown on junk food advertising in the UK. From 1 October 2025, adverts for this type of product will be banned before 9pm, to protect children and young people in particular, the main target of foods that – according to complaints from doctors and health organisations – threaten the health of consumers and contribute to the multiplication of cases of obesity, including youth obesity, which is on the rise in the UK as in many other Western countries.
The measure, with the date of entry into force a year from now, was formalized by the new Labour executive in a document submitted yesterday to the House of Commons by the Deputy Minister of Health, Andrew Gwynne, and cited today by various British newspapers. Gwynne evoked the need to “address the problem without further delay”.
The crusade against ‘junk food’ had been launched in recent years in particular by the Tory government of Boris Johnson, protagonist of a personal health turn against overweight after the dramatic hospitalization in intensive care for Covid in 2020. Under BoJo’s leadership, several restrictive measures had been launched on the promotion and sale of “junk food” or hyper-sugary drinks; and an advertising ban had initially been set until 9 pm as early as 2021: a deadline however then postponed by Parliament to allow a more gradual transition to the industry.
The new date now indicated by Labour – which had promised to return to the issue in the election manifesto presented before the victory at the polls on 4 July – has been welcomed by the Royal Society for Public Health as “a positive step” towards combating childhood obesity, the BBC highlights.
2024-09-15 17:08:35