Potential impact of gradual reduction of fat content in manufactured and out-of-home food on obesity in the United Kingdom: a modeling study

ABSTRACT Background Manufactured and out-of-home foods contribute to excessive calories and have a critical role in fueling the obesity epidemic. We propose a 20% fat reduction in these foods. Objectives To evaluate the potential impact of the proposed strategy on energy intake, obesity and related health outcomes in the population. Methods We used the National Diet and Nutrition Survey rolling program (NDNS RP) data to calculate fat and energy contributions from 46 manufactured and out-of-home food categories. We considered a gradual fat reduction—focusing on SFA—in these categories to achieve a 20% reduction in 5 years. We estimated the reduction in energy intake in the NDNS RP population and predicted the body weight reduction using a weight loss model. We scaled up the body weight reduction to the UK adult population. We estimated reductions in overweight/obesity and type 2 diabetes cases. We calculated the reductions of LDL, ischemic heart disease (IHD), and stroke deaths that could be prevented from the SFA reduction. Results The selected categories contributed to 38.6% of the population's energy intake. By the end of the fifth year, our proposed strategy would reduce the mean energy intake by 67.6 kcal/d/person (95% CI: 66.1–68.8). The energy reduction would reduce the mean body weight by 2.7 kg (95% CI: 2.6–2.8). The obesity prevalence would be reduced by 5.3% and the overweight prevalence by 1.5%, corresponding to 3.5 and 1 million cases of obesity and overweight, respectively, being reduced in the United Kingdom. The body weight reduction could prevent 183,000 (95% CI: 171,000–194,000) cases of type 2 diabetes over 2 decades. Energy from SFA would fall by 2.6%, lowering LDL by 0.13 mmol/L and preventing 87,560 IHD deaths (95% CI: 82,260–112,760) and 9520 stroke deaths (95% CI: 4400–14,660) over 20 years. Conclusions A modest fat reduction (particularly in SFA) in widely consumed foods would prevent obesity, type 2 diabetes, and cardiovascular disease.