Elizabeth Handsley

Regulatory approaches to obesity prevention: A systematic overview of current laws addressing diet-related risk factors in the European Union and the United States.

High prevalence of overweight and obesity remains a significant international public health problem. Law has been identified as a tool for obesity prevention and selected high-profile measures have been reported. However, the nature and extent of enacted legislation internationally are unclear. This research provides an overview of regulatory approaches enacted in the United States, the European Union, and EU Member States since 2004. To this end, relevant databases of primary and secondary legislation were systematically searched to identify and explore laws addressing dietary risk factors for obesity. Across jurisdictions, current regulatory approaches to obesity prevention are limited in reach and scope. Target groups are rarely the general population, but instead sub-populations in government-supported settings. Consumer information provision is preferred over taxation and marketing restrictions other than the regulation of health and nutrition claims. In the EU in particular, product reformulation with industry consent has also emerged as a popular small-scale measure. While consistent and widespread use of law is lacking, governments have employed a range of regulatory measures in the name of obesity prevention, indicating that there is, in principle, political will. Results from this study may serve as a starting point for future research and policy development.

A Children’s Rights Perspective on Food Advertising to Children

This article applies the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child to the regulation of food advertising for the prevention of childhood obesity, evaluating the advertising regulation in six jurisdictions against the principles of the Convention. It finds that the Convention would support strict regulation of food advertising for the prevention of childhood obesity; and in particular that such regulation would be appropriate to the model of co-operation between the state and parents that the Convention posits. The article also raises the question whether the grooming of children as consumers through advertising might be a form of economic exploitation.

Law School Lemonade: Or Can You Turn External Pressures into Educational Advantages?

In a context of ever-dwindling resources, this article encourages legal academics to seek innovative strategies to safeguard the integrity of our mission. Teaching innovation funding, more effective use of students as a resource and a willingness to be flexible when it comes to content coverage are suggested as means to maintain, or even improve, not just teaching quality but morale among academic staff. The article challenges the notion that smaller class sizes are necessary for higher teaching quality, suggesting the alternative of collaborative learning groups to keep students engaged and to encourage deep and independent approaches to learning. Collaborative learning provides additional benefits in freeing up staff time and engaging us in the educational process at a level more commensurate with our skills and expertise.

International human rights law and the prevention of childhood obesity

ABSTRACT This article surveys the application of international human rights law to obesity prevention laws, such as restrictions on marketing unhealthy food to children, interpretive front-of-pack labelling, healthy food policies in schools and the public sector, and taxes on unhealthy products. It discusses the right to health, the right to food, freedom of commercial speech, the rights of the child and a range of World Health Organization initiatives. Such instruments can provide both constitutional power and political cover for such measures, as well as providing policy guidance in selecting the most appropriate ones.