The team, led by Professor Emily Rousham in the School of Sport, Exercise and Health Sciences, was commissioned by the WHO to carry out a systematic review on the effects of consumption of unhealthy foods and beverages on child health outcomes.
Unlike many reviews which focus on child nutrition in high income countries only, the review team examined all available studies globally including low-income and middle-income countries.
The results of the systematic review indicated that consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages and unhealthy foods may increase body mass index (BMI), percent body fat or risk of overweight and obesity in children.
However, researchers believe that there is still much work to be done to understand the effects of unhealthy food and beverage consumption in infancy and childhood, particularly in low- and middle-income country settings where diets are rapidly changing, and where multiple forms of malnutrition co-exist.
Professor Rousham explained: “We examined the risks of high consumption of unhealthy foods, such as those high in sugar, salt or unhealthy fats as well as sugar-sweetened beverages on child overweight, obesity, heart and metabolic disease markers, and other health outcomes including dental health (caries), and dietary diversity.
“Our review highlighted that there are relatively few studies that have looked at the longitudinal associations between dietary intakes and health outcomes in children under the age of 2 years, which is an important research gap, and there were no studies meeting our review criteria that had been carried out in low-income countries”
The authors noted that further high quality studies of food consumption in early life and later health consequences are still needed to contribute to the evidence base to strengthen policy recommendations.
Following all available evidence, including the review by Professor Rousham and co-authors, the WHO now recommends that children aged under 2 years should not consume foods high in sugar, salt and trans fats or sugar-sweetened beverages.
The systematic review was one of several commissioned reports by the WHO which fed into the guideline development process. The WHO guideline on complementary feeding of infants and young children is intended for a wide audience, including policy-makers, government institutions and those involved in implementation programmes for infants and young children as well as caregivers, healthcare professionals and researchers.
Complementary feeding is the process of providing additional foods to the diet alongside milk when breast milk or milk formula alone are no longer adequate to meet the nutritional needs of infants. Complementary feeding generally starts at age 6 months and continues until 23 months of age.
Hence, this is a critical time of development for infants and young children when they need to meet high nutrient requirements for healthy growth and development as well as establishing healthy dietary patterns for later life.
Details of the published findings of the systematic review can be found by visiting the below sources:
- Rousham EK, Goudet S, Markey O, Griffiths P, Boxer B, Carroll C, Petherick ES, Pradeilles R. Unhealthy Food and Beverage Consumption in Children and Risk of Overweight and Obesity: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. Adv Nutr. 2022 Volume 13, Issue 5:1669-1696. doi: 10.1093/advances/nmac032, https://advances.nutrition.org/article/S2161-8313(23)00033-9/fulltext
- Markey O, Pradeilles R, Goudet S, Griffiths PL, Boxer B, Carroll C, Rousham EK. Unhealthy Food and Beverage Consumption during Childhood and Risk of Cardiometabolic Disease: A Systematic Review of Prospective Cohort Studies. The Journal of Nutrition, 2023; Volume 153, Issue 1, 176–189. doi: 10.1016/j.tjnut.2022.11.013. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tjnut.2022.11.013
The new WHO guideline on Complementary Feeding of Infants and Young Children can be found here: https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240081864