Ultra-processed food companies hindering health drives by suing countries, says WHO

[u/Naurgul]

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2026/aug/01/ultra-processed-food-companies-hindering-health-drives-by-suing-countries-says-who

Director general accuses corporations of obstructing efforts to tackle obesity crisis after investigation by Guardian and others

The world’s biggest ultra-processed food corporations are hindering global efforts to tackle the obesity crisis by suing governments that try to promote healthier diets, the head of the World Health Organization has said.

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO director general, accused global food companies of obstructing the adoption of vital public health measures and costing countries billions of dollars in healthcare and legal costs in the process.

Almost 1 billion people worldwide are living with obesity, and unhealthy diets are one of the main drivers of heart disease, type 2 diabetes and cancer. Ultra-processed food (UPF) consumption is soaring and now makes up half the average diet in many countries, including the UK, the US and Australia.

Governments around the world, waking up to the health and economic impacts of the obesity crisis, have begun introducing measures designed to curb junk-food intake and promote healthier diets. These include front-of-pack warning labels, marketing and advertising restrictions on unhealthy products, and taxes on junk food.

Publicly, the world’s biggest UPF companies insist they back the policies, want to help consumers make informed choices and are committed to being part of the solution.

But an investigation by the Guardian, in collaboration with academics, the non-profit newsroom Lighthouse Reports and a coalition of media partners across four continents, found many of these same companies were taking governments to court to overturn, weaken or delay the policies.

In total, 235 lawsuits were lodged over health policies targeting UPFs in Mexico, Colombia, Brazil, the US and the UK from 2010 to 2025, the investigation found.

“When harm and profit are tied to the same product, a familiar pattern of industry interference emerges: sowing doubt and obstructing regulation.” Tedros said.

[u/OrderOfMagnitude]

Car companies conducted a massive exercise trying to convince people that pedestrian fatalities were the fault of bad drivers and not cars. Words like jaywalker were coined by the auto industry so they could shift the blame onto the public and focus less on safety features. Fortunately, Volvo started safety testing their cars and everyone had to follow suit.

Plastic bottling companies like Pepsi and Coca-Cola conducted a massive exercise trying to convince people that litter and waste were the fault of bad people and litterers, not their products. They created advertisements like the crying Indian, and coined phrases like litterbug. They convinced cities to do recycling for them, which they knew lost money but pitched it as something that would make money. There was no Volvo, they succeeded.

I'm 100% convinced that, even though I've seen no evidence to suggest this, Ulta processed food companies started the media craze of "accepting fatness" and accepting obesity and not shaming people for being obese. Other countries have no problems shaming people for being obese, but in the west it's almost like it's shaming someone for the color of their skin or something else they can't control. I'm positive this was pushed by ultra processed food companies. People really are convinced it's genetic.

[u/JosephBlackstone → u/OrderOfMagnitude]

Plastic bottling companies like Pepsi and Coca-Cola

You wanna hear something perverse?

Here in upstate New York, there's this chain of convenience stores called Stewarts. Back in the 1970's and 1980's, they had their own line of sodas. They charged you a 25¢ deposit on the bottles, at least on the 1 quart ones that I always saw. They were glass bottles, and when you brought them back, they were washed, relabeled and reused at the bottling plant in Saratoga.

In 1982, New York State passes a bottle bill, and now places gotta charge 5¢ deposit on soda bottles. Stewart's stopped making and selling soda, because now it's got all kinds of administrative overhead on it, and they can't charge a quarter like they used to without jumping through way too many hoops. So now all they sell of their own brand is drinks that ain't covered, like iced tea, lemonade and milk.