The menus of 451 hospitals were surveyed to assess the salt and saturated fat content of the food given to children, with results showing that nearly one in three of all menu items would be classified ‘red’ for saturated fat or salt according to the Food Standards Agency’s traffic light labelling scheme.
The research was carried out by Consensus Action on Salt and Health (CASH) and Sustain.
“With everything we know about the risk of children developing high blood pressure and diet-related diseases such as obesity, it is vital to keep their consumption of salt and saturated fat as low as possible, whilst still being appetising” says Professor Graham MacGregor of the Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine and Chairman of CASH. “When such great progress has been made on what pupils are eating in school it is shocking that children in hospitals are being ignored.”