Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what discussions the recent UK Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition meeting had on (a) ultra-processed foods and (b) future policies to reduce consumption of those foods.

Dietary recommendations for the United Kingdom are based on independent advice from the Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (SACN).

In July 2023, the SACN published a position statement on processed foods and health, summarising a scoping review of the evidence on food processing and health. The SACN concluded that observed associations between ultra-processed foods and health are concerning, but it is unclear whether these foods are inherently unhealthy due to processing or due to their nutritional content. Given the SACN’s concerns, the committee agreed to consider the issue again at its horizon scan in October 2024. At the meeting, the SACN considered a draft update review on this topic which considers more recently published evidence. It also considered the draft update review at its meeting in November 2024. Papers for these meetings are available on the SACN’s webpages. The SACN is planning to publish the update review on processed foods in 2025.

The SACN has only a dietary risk assessment remit. The SACN is not involved in policy development, and therefore has not had discussions on policies to reduce consumption of processed foods.