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<p>The Government is delivering a wide range of measures to reduce the numbers of
both adults and children who are overweight, or living with obesity. To date this
includes legislative measures to limit the advertising, and location and price promotion,
of less healthy products, and to ensure calorie levels are provided on menus when
eating out of the home. Impact assessments for the legislated measures suggest there
will be substantial health benefits, as well as savings to the National Health Service,
accrued.</p><p>We have seen important successes through the Soft Drinks Industry Levy
(SDIL), which between 2015 and 2020 has seen sugar levels reduced by 46% in, and over
46,000 tonnes of sugar removed from, products in scope of the levy. Data from the
National Diet and Nutrition Survey from 2019 shows that sugar intakes have fallen
for some age groups. In older children and adolescents, this appears to be partly
driven by soft drinks contributing less to sugar intakes, likely as a result of the
changes made to drinks included in the SDIL. Further information from the survey is
available at the following link:</p><p> </p><p><a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/ndns-results-from-years-9-to-11-2016-to-2017-and-2018-to-2019"
target="_blank">https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/ndns-results-from-years-9-to-11-2016-to-2017-and-2018-to-2019</a></p><p>
</p><p>A paper on the association of obesity in primary school children and the SDIL
suggests that the reduction in the sugar content of soft drinks delivered by the SDIL
could have prevented up to 5,000 cases of obesity in girls in the last year of primary
school. Reductions were greatest in girls who attended schools in the 40% of the most
deprived areas. Further information from the paper is available at the following link:</p><p>
</p><p><a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1004160"
target="_blank">https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1004160</a></p><p>
</p><p>The voluntary reformulation programme requires businesses reduce levels of
sugar, salt, and calories in everyday food and drink. Levels of sugar have reduced
in breakfast cereals, yogurts, and pre-packed milk-based drinks by 15%, 13.5%, and
29.7% respectively, between 2015 and 2020. Levels of salt have reduced in some products
by 20%.</p>
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