Healthy place, healthy weight
The Mayor believes that all Londoners should have a healthy start in life. He is determined to help turn around the shocking childhood obesity rates in the city, where two in five children are obese. It is a matter of shame that children living in the most deprived areas are worst affected, being more than twice as likely to be obese than children living in the more affluent areas.
The Mayor wants to create healthy places that support families to maintain a healthy weight and make it easier for them to eat healthy food and be active where they live, learn, shop work and play. This work forms a core part of London’s Recovery Programme.
Obesity is caused by much more than just the choices we make, with many factors than can influence a family’s ability to maintain a healthy weight. This work therefore focuses on changing our wider environment instead of individual behaviour change. By taking a preventative approach and building on great partnership work already happening across the city, we can shape places that support and promote good health.
Achieving the healthy weight, healthy place vision together
The Mayor is working with partners to:
- Deliver a network of school Superzones to create healthier environments around schools
- Ensure as many schools in London as possible are ‘water only’, to minimise the harm caused by excess sugary drink consumption
- Extend healthy food advertising policies beyond the TfL estate
- Take action to support infant feeding, including breastfeeding
- Make it easier for Londoners to eat healthy food and be active, including piloting a wellbeing cart in transport hub locations and working with convenience stores to increase the range and sales of healthier, affordable food
Join the conversation on Talk London as this work develops
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- The Mayor’s work on healthy place, healthy weight also supports the Health Inequalities Strategy implementation plan key commitment to create healthier environments around schools.
- The London Food Strategy was developed by the Greater London Authority (GLA) on behalf of the Mayor of London and in partnership with the London Food Board. It aims to ensure all Londoners have access to healthy and sustainable food.
- The London Plan 2021 sets out a framework for how London will develop over the next 20-25 years and the Mayor’s vision for Good Growth.
- ‘Every Child a Healthy Weight’, is a report by London’s Child Obesity Taskforce (now the Mayoral Advisory Group on Child Healthy Weight), setting out ten shared ambitions for creating a healthy-weight city.
- The London Vision for Health and Care is a partnership between the Greater London Authority, UK Health Security Agency, Office for Health Improvement and Disparities, London Councils and the NHS in London. Under the Vision, partners have committed to action to reduce child obesity.