Obesity prevention and personal responsibility: the case of front-of-pack food labelling in Australia

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>In Australia, the food industry and public health groups are locked in serious struggle for regulatory influence over the terms of front-of-pack food labelling. Clear, unambiguous labelling of the nutritional content of pre-packaged foods and of standardized food items sold in chain restaurants is consistent with the prevailing philosophy of 'personal responsibility'. An interpretive, front-of-pack labelling scheme has the capacity to encourage healthier patterns of eating, and to be a catalyst for improvements in the nutritional quality of food products through re-formulation. On the other hand, the strength of opposition of the Australian Food and Grocery Council to 'Traffic Light Labelling', and its efforts to promote a non-interpretive, voluntary scheme, invite the interpretation that the food industry is resistant to any reforms that could destabilise current (unhealthy) purchasing patterns and the revenues they represent.</p> <p>Discussion</p> <p>This article argues that although policies that aim to educate consumers about the nutritional content of food are welcome, they are only one part of a broader basket of policies that are needed to make progress on obesity prevention and public health nutrition. However, to the extent that food labelling has the capacity to inform and empower consumers to make healthier choices - and to be a catalyst for improving the nutritional quality of commercial recipes - it has an important role to play. Furthermore, given the dietary impact of meals eaten in fast food and franchise restaurants, interpretive labelling requirements should not be restricted to pre-packaged foods.</p> <p>Summary</p> <p>Food industry resistance to an interpretive food labelling scheme is an important test for government, and a case study of how self-interest prompts industry to promote weaker, voluntary schemes that pre-empt and undermine progressive public health regulation.</p

Studying Public Health Law::Principles, Politics, and Populations as Patients

Public health law is firmly establishing itself as a crucial area of scholarly inquiry. Its vital importance has been sharply underscored following the outbreak of COVID-19, in response to which we have seen the institution of extreme legal measures—suchas the UK’s Coronavirus Act 2020—in efforts to control and contain the spread ofthe disease. The pandemic has also starkly exposed the complex nature of the regulatory challenges, nationally, internationally, and globally, to which such public health problems give rise. In approaching these, and other questions concerning the public’s health, such as non-communicable disease, public health law, as a field, brings notable distinctive features: these include a practical focus on populations, institutions, the prevention of ill health, protection of good health, and thepromotion of positive states of well-being; and concomitant critical approaches rooted in theories of social justice as contrasted with more narrow biomedical ethics. Such features make it in some senses atypical territory within the field of health law. Furthermore, the inherent role of political institutions places law conceptually within public health in a way that may be seen as distinguishable from law’s relationship with clinical medicine. This chapter explains how the broad reach and distinct features of public health require a commensurately broad approach to conceptualising public health law, and how distinct practical and theoretical features may be integrated into academic public health law. It also shows how public health law, with its distinct conceptualisations concerning ‘the body’ of medical jurisprudence, can both challenge and enrich medico-legal studies, and bring important perspectives within the broader field of health law