WHO says ultra-processed food giants are suing countries over health rules

The director-general of the World Health Organization has said the world's biggest ultra-processed food corporations are using litigation against national governments to slow or block policies intended to promote healthier diets, adding legal and financial risk to countries already struggling to contain rising obesity rates. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus made the comments following an investigation examining corporate responses to public health measures around the world.

The investigation, conducted in collaboration with several media organisations, found examples of food and beverage companies challenging measures such as warning labels on sugary or high-fat products, restrictions on advertising to children, and taxes on sugar-sweetened beverages, arguing in various jurisdictions that such measures violate trade agreements or constitutional protections for commercial speech.

Public health researchers have long argued that ultra-processed foods, industrially manufactured products typically high in added sugar, salt, fat and additives, play a significant role in the global rise of obesity, type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. The WHO has previously flagged the products as a growing contributor to the burden of noncommunicable disease, particularly in middle-income countries undergoing rapid dietary shifts.

According to the investigation, litigation and the threat of litigation have in some cases delayed or watered down proposed regulations, as governments, particularly smaller or lower-income nations with limited legal budgets, weigh the cost of defending a policy in court against the political and fiscal ease of abandoning it. Legal costs associated with defending public health measures have, in some instances, run into the millions of dollars.

Tedros said the pattern represented a direct obstacle to global efforts to curb the obesity epidemic, framing it as part of a broader tension between public health objectives and commercial interests that has also played out in tobacco control and, more recently, in efforts to regulate the marketing of infant formula. He called for greater international support to help countries defend health policies against legal challenges.

Industry representatives have pushed back on characterisations of their legal strategies as obstructionist, arguing that companies have a right to challenge regulations they believe are poorly designed, disproportionate, or not grounded in robust evidence. Some industry groups have said reformulation efforts and voluntary commitments to reduce sugar and salt content demonstrate a willingness to support public health goals through means other than litigation.

Several countries have nonetheless pressed ahead with contested measures. Front-of-package warning labels, first popularised in Latin America, have spread to a growing number of countries despite legal challenges, with public health advocates pointing to preliminary evidence that clearer labelling can shift consumer purchasing habits over time, even if the effect on population-level health outcomes takes longer to measure.

Trade law specialists say the legal terrain remains genuinely contested, noting that international trade agreements do include provisions protecting commercial interests that governments must account for when designing new regulations. But several specialists cited in the investigation said companies have, in specific instances, stretched those provisions well beyond their original intent to discourage regulation more broadly.

The WHO's comments come as the organisation continues to push a broader agenda on noncommunicable disease prevention, an area officials say has received comparatively little global funding relative to infectious disease response, despite noncommunicable diseases accounting for a large majority of global deaths. Obesity-related conditions in particular have strained health budgets in countries at every income level.

Advocates for stronger regulation say the investigation's findings should prompt renewed discussion at the international level about creating legal frameworks or support mechanisms specifically designed to protect lower-income countries from the disproportionate cost of defending public health policy in court, framing it as a matter of equity between wealthy multinational companies and governments with far more limited resources.