Experts from the Netherlands launched the discussion about eliminating fast food focused on children and even imposing a minimum age to consume it, for the benefit of health.
In the Netherlands, the legal minimum age of 18 is applied to buy alcohol, tobacco and drugs, which is justified by the damage they have on health, but a harmful effect is also linked to the fast food and a group of experts urges to ban its and even sale to children.
A “radically different way of treating what we eat and drink is needed so that the lifestyle and the body are better,” he tells Efe Gerard Eagleindependent health and lifestyle policy adviser, and one of the authors of the report published by the Scientific Institute of the Christian Democrat CDA, one of the four parties that make up the coalition that governs the Netherlands.
Among other issues, the group of experts recommends a prohibition of the of unhealthy foods, reaching agreements on the supply of this type of food, and the increase in the prices of fast food so that it is no longer a first option, and if the industry does not change its essence, resort to the minimum old as a pressure tool.
The Netherlands and its fast food debate
The authors of the report see similarities precisely with the historical debates on alcohol and tobacco, for which there is now a minimum age, but they consider that “unhealthy food is now causing more harm than smoking.” Obesity, diabetes or cardiovascular diseases are related to poor diet.
In fact, Adelaar believes that fast food should be understood in the same way that alcohol and tobacco are understood today, two products “very harmful to health”, so consumers should be prevented from starting to use them from very young.
“How realistic is this? Well, we also asked ourselves the same question twenty years ago, when measures against tobacco and alcohol were introduced. And these measures are today very normalized. The real problem is that there is a mismatch between our lifestyle and the body.explica Eagle.
Only if the restaurants that sell fast food do not work to improve their offers with healthier menus, it is suggested to prohibit the sale of fast food to children and young people, although the minimum legal age that should be established in the Netherlands is not defined to radically reduce the access of the youngest to unhealthy foods.
It is the first time in the country that it is proposed to limit this offer by establishing a minimum age for its purchase and if the proposal materializes in a potential law backed by Parliament and the Senate, The Netherlands would become the first country where children could no longer, for example, celebrate their birthday party in a fast food restaurant.
“A bit condescending”
The study understands “body care as a common good”, but the proposal has already generated some opposition in the Netherlands. Rudmer Heerema, a deputy from the right-liberal group VVD – the party of Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte – sees this idea as “a bit condescending” with the parents.
“Imagine: a children’s party without chips and croquettes, but with Brussels sprouts. We’re not going to do something like that. We’ll just give everyone a serving of chips every once in a while,” she noted, reacting to the proposal.
But Adelaar recalled that “when smoking was banned in cafeterias it also seemed like a condescending decision” with citizens: “But now I love it, me and a lot of people”, he pointed. The plan is part of a broad package of proposals to “raise a healthy generation” that understands that a healthy lifestyle must be maintained from an early age.
Forum for Democracy, FvD, of the far-right Thierry Baudet, does not agree with the idea either and believes that “The health of children remains the responsibility of the parents and the government should not interfere in everything, must let the people make their own decisions,” the party said in a brief message on Twitter.
From within the CDA party itself, deputy Anne Kuik stressed that the Scientific Institute had written an “important report on healthy living” and that “obesity is a growing problem, also among children”, but admitted that the option of “minimum age goes too far” and that it is necessary to focus first on the industry itself.
But the experts are clear: “The rules of the game for the fast food industry must change, or we will continue with the same problems,” concluded Adelaar.