專家呼籲限制垃圾食品廣告

Junk food ads account for two-thirds of televised advertisements for food that are shown when children are likely to be watching, researchers into obesity said Friday, based on a study of 11 countries.

Germany and the United States led the way at 90 percent, with Britain and Australia the lowest at about 50 percent, the researchers said, urging governments to limit such marketing in order to combat obesity.

"Internationally, children are exposed to high volumes of unhealthy food and beverage advertising on television," Bridget Kelly, a nutrition researcher at the Cancer Council NSW in Australia, and colleagues told the European Congress on Obesity in Amsterdam.

"Limiting this food marketing is an important preventative strategy for childhood obesity."

About 177 million children and teenagers under 18 years old worldwide are clinically overweight or obese. The figures include 22 million overweight children under five years old, according to the International Obesity Task Force.

Obesity raises the risk of conditions like heart disease and type 2 diabetes, and the growing epidemic is piling pressure on many cash-strapped national health systems.

Unhealthy lifestyles including high-calorie diets, poor exercise and hours spent in front of the television or computer have contributed to the surge in childhood obesity.

"There is a lot of attention on unhealthy food marketing as an influence on childhood obesity and a lot of governments are reluctant to regulate," Kelly said in an interview. "So most countries in the study don't have regulations on food advertising."

The researchers, who looked at children in Australia, Asia, Eastern and Western Europe and North and South America, found that junk food ads mainly featuring fast food, confectionery and high-fat dairy foods increased during times young people were most likely to be watching.

"Children see around 4,000 to 6,000 food advertisements on television a year and between 2,000 and 4,000 are for unhealthy foods," Kelly said. "So even if you are in countries that are advertising less to children, that is still a lot."

While establishing a direct link between advertising and obesity is difficult, it is clear marketing plays a big role in the kinds of food children prefer, the researchers said.

肥胖研究人員於上週五稱，在兒童很可能看電視的時段播出的食品廣告中，有三分之二是垃圾食品。該結果基於一項針對11個國家的研究。

研究人員稱，德國和美國以90%的比例遙遙領先於其它各國，英國和澳大利亞最低，約爲50%。研究人員呼籲政府限制此類廣告以抵禦肥胖。

澳大利亞新南威爾士州癌症協會的營養學研究人員布利吉特•凱利和他的同事在阿姆斯特丹舉行的歐洲肥胖會議上稱：“從全球來看，兒童正接觸到大量不健康食品和飲料的電視廣告。”

“限制這類食品廣告是預防兒童肥胖的一個重要手段。”

據國際肥胖工作小組介紹，全球約有1.77億18歲以下的兒童和青少年被診斷爲臨牀超重或肥胖，這其中包括2200萬五歲以下的體重超標兒童。

肥胖會增加患心臟病和II型糖尿病等疾病的風險，而且患此類病症人數的不斷上升也給很多醫療資金不充裕的國家增加了壓力。

不健康的生活方式是導致兒童肥胖劇增的重要原因，其中包括高熱量飲食、缺少鍛鍊、在電視機或電腦前連坐幾個小時等。

凱利在接受採訪時說：“人們非常關注不健康食品廣告對兒童肥胖的影響，但很多國家的政府不願對此加以限制。因此被調查的大多數國家沒有食品廣告限制條例。”

研究人員對澳洲、亞洲、東西歐、南北美洲的兒童進行了調查。結果發現，在年輕人最可能看電視的時段，以快餐、糖果、高脂乳制食品爲主的垃圾食品廣告數量增加。

凱利說：“兒童每年會在電視上看到約四千到六千個食品廣告，其中有兩千到四千個是不健康食品的廣告。所以即使在兒童較少看廣告的國家，這也是個不小的數目。”

研究人員稱，儘管不能將廣告和肥胖直接聯繫起來，但很明顯廣告對兒童所偏好的食品種類有重要影響。