IPM Take
For decades, health systems have focused on treating the consequences of unhealthy diets: obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, stroke and even some cancers. Increasingly, governments are asking a different question. What if the food environment itself is the intervention point? From advertising restrictions in the United Kingdom to food labelling reforms in Indonesia and growing calls for stronger regulation in the United States, ultra-processed foods are moving from a nutrition debate to a regulatory debate. The political challenge is no longer whether unhealthy diets drive disease. The challenge is whether governments are willing to regulate the industries that profit from them.
Executive Summary
A growing number of countries are introducing policies aimed at reducing consumption of ultra-processed foods and products high in salt, sugar and unhealthy fats. Indonesia is implementing mandatory front-of-pack labelling, marketing restrictions and product reformulation measures. The United Kingdom has introduced restrictions on advertising unhealthy foods before 9pm and online. Public health advocates in the United States are increasingly calling for warning labels, taxes and stronger regulation of ultra-processed foods, while India continues to debate implementation of front-of-pack nutrition labelling. Together, these developments signal a broader shift towards population-level prevention strategies targeting the commercial drivers of cardiometabolic disease.
Why it matters
- Policymakers: Food policy is becoming an increasingly important tool in national strategies to address obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease and stroke.
- Public health authorities: Population-wide interventions may offer greater impact than programmes focused solely on individual behaviour change.
- Industry: Food manufacturers are facing growing pressure to reformulate products, modify marketing practices and improve transparency.
- Patients and consumers: New policies may make healthier choices easier by changing how foods are marketed, labelled and priced.
The global response to cardiometabolic disease is beginning to change.
For years, prevention efforts focused largely on individual responsibility. People were encouraged to eat healthier diets, reduce sugar intake, consume less salt and become more physically active.
Those messages remain important.
But policymakers are increasingly recognising a harder truth: individual choices are shaped by the environments in which those choices are made.
If unhealthy products dominate supermarket shelves, are aggressively marketed to children and remain cheaper than healthier alternatives, education alone may have limited impact.
This shift in thinking is driving a new generation of food policies around the world.
Indonesia offers one of the most ambitious recent examples.
Faced with rising rates of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease and stroke, the country is implementing regulations requiring front-of-pack nutrition labelling, menu labelling, product reformulation and restrictions on unhealthy food marketing. The framework also creates the possibility of future taxation on products high in salt, sugar and fat.
According to WHO, dietary risk factors have become the third-largest contributor to death and disability in Indonesia. More than half of cardiovascular deaths are linked to unhealthy diets, alongside substantial proportions of stroke and diabetes mortality.
The United Kingdom has adopted a different but related approach.
In 2026, new restrictions came into force limiting television advertising of unhealthy foods before 9pm and banning paid online advertising of products high in fat, sugar and salt. The objective is clear: reduce children’s exposure to marketing that influences lifelong dietary behaviours.
Meanwhile, pressure is growing in the United States.
Public health researchers and advocacy groups increasingly argue that ultra-processed foods should be treated similarly to tobacco, with stronger warning labels, restrictions on marketing and fiscal measures designed to discourage excessive consumption. Recent editorials and public health campaigns have highlighted growing evidence linking ultra-processed foods not only to obesity and diabetes but also to cardiovascular disease, stroke, cognitive decline and certain cancers.
India illustrates the challenges of implementation.
Although discussions around front-of-pack warning labels and restrictions on unhealthy food marketing have continued for years, progress has been slower than many public health experts had hoped. The debate highlights a recurring challenge facing governments worldwide: translating scientific consensus into regulatory action often proves politically difficult.
The reason these debates matter extends beyond nutrition.
Cardiometabolic diseases have become one of the defining healthcare challenges of the twenty-first century. Obesity, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease and metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease are rising in almost every region of the world. Health systems are struggling to manage the clinical and financial consequences.
At the same time, evidence increasingly points towards common upstream drivers.
Highly processed foods engineered for taste, convenience and shelf life now account for a substantial proportion of calorie intake in many countries. These products are often high in salt, sugar, unhealthy fats and additives while providing limited nutritional value.
For policymakers, the question is becoming less about whether unhealthy diets contribute to disease.
The evidence is already overwhelming.
The question is whether governments are prepared to intervene in the food environment with the same determination that many previously applied to tobacco control.
That remains politically controversial.
Industry groups frequently argue that consumer choice should remain paramount, while public health advocates counter that meaningful choice becomes difficult when healthier options are less accessible, less affordable and less visible.
The outcome of that debate could shape the future of cardiometabolic health. For IPM, the signal is becoming increasingly difficult to ignore. The next major advances in cardiometabolic disease prevention may not come from a medicine cabinet.
They may come from supermarket shelves.
