Knowing how to prevent cancer is only half the battle. Making sure that knowledge actually works in real schools, clinics and hospitals is the other half – and that’s exactly what three newly funded research projects are now setting out to test.

This is important work. About four in ten cancer cases could be prevented, yet proven prevention methods – from HPV vaccination to stop-smoking support – don’t always reach the people who could benefit from them most.

Closing that gap is the aim of Reimagining Cancer Research in Europe, an initiative bringing together cancer charities and researchers from across the continent, coordinated through our long-standing partnership with the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC).

At World Cancer Research Fund International and our network partner Wereld Kanker Onderzoek Fonds (WKOF), we are proud to be supporters of this initiative – both as co-funders and members of its steering committee.

Rather than searching for new scientific discoveries, this programme funds what’s known as “implementation research” – studying the best ways to get prevention methods that already work adopted into everyday healthcare, in support of Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan and Europe’s Mission on Cancer.

In this latest funding round, three international research collaborations have been awarded a combined €1.49 million to test new approaches over the next two years:

• Preventing tobacco and vaping in schools (FRESHAIR4Schools) – researchers in the Netherlands and Poland are adapting a WHO-aligned tobacco- and nicotine-free school policy, a youth vaping-prevention programme and an eHealth quit-support tool for use in Polish secondary schools. The aim is to help protect young people from a habit that remains one of the biggest drivers of preventable cancer.
• Reaching women in wartime Ukraine (HPV-FASTER) – a team spanning France, Ukraine and the UK is testing whether combining HPV self-sampling, vaccination and counselling can help more women access cervical cancer screening and prevention, even in conflict-affected regions.
• Preventing ovarian cancer through simple surgery (STOPOVCA-Europe) – researchers in the Netherlands and Romania are working to roll out a proven Dutch approach – removing the fallopian tubes during other planned surgery, known as opportunistic salpingectomy – to help prevent ovarian cancer more widely across Europe.

These are still early days. Each project has up to two years to test and refine its approach.

Research Translation Manager at World Cancer Research Fund International,
Dr Vanessa Gordon-Dseagu, said:

“Nearly four in ten cancers could be prevented. That’s the opportunity UICC’s newly funded international research collaborations are seizing. The three projects are pushing forward our understanding of how to stop cancer before it starts, from tackling tobacco use to preventing cervical and ovarian cancers.

“By finding better ways to prevent, detect and diagnose cancer early, this work will help life-saving interventions reach more people, more consistently, to improve the health of communities across Europe and beyond.”

World Cancer Research Fund has been a partner of UICC for many years. Our partnership includes collaboration on scientific papers, global advocacy on cancer – including contributing to WHO statements and membership of the UICC global advocacy advisory group – and participation in the UICC World Cancer Leaders’ Summit and World Cancer Congress. We’re also members of the UICC Cancer Prevention Network, contribute to the International Cancer Control Partnership portal and support UICC’s World Cancer Day.

Co-funders: This initiative is co-funded by World Cancer Research Fund International, Wereld Kanker Onderzoek Fonds (WKOF), the Dutch Cancer Society (KWF), the Swedish Cancer Society (Cancerfonden) and the Danish Cancer Society, with scientific input from the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC, part of the World Health Organization). 

Over the past few months, fans across the world have come together to watch football, cricket, rugby and more. Major sporting events like the FIFA World Cup, Commonwealth Games, and Wimbledon are a time to celebrate excellence at the highest levels of sport. They also bring people together in support of their national teams and athletes with joy, passion and pride. Yet looming over these events is the pervasive sponsorship and advertisement of health-harming products, particularly alcohol and junk food, which directly contradict the essence of sport. This can best be described as “sportswashing” – the practice of using sport and its positive associations to enhance reputations and divert attention from the negative impacts of an individual, product, company, or government.

Promotion of health-harming products and cancer risk

As a cancer prevention charity, the pervasive presence of alcohol and junk food promotions at sporting events watched by millions, and in some cases billions, is deeply concerning. Around 40% of cancer cases are caused by risk factors such as alcohol and obesity and it has long been established that the marketing of alcohol and unhealthy food and drink drives consumption of these products. This is a child rights issue. The UN Committee on the Rights of the Child has stated that the marketing of health-harming products to children impedes their right to life, survival and development as set out in Article 6 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. This is unsurprising given evidence that junk food advertising is associated with childhood obesity whilst alcohol marketing has also been shown to increase uptake and consumption amongst young people.

Despite this, we live in a world where sporting events are closely intertwined with the promotion of health-harming products that are known to contribute to cancer and other diseases. This is part of a wider strategy through which health-harming industries align themselves with sport, from local grassroots clubs and children’s physical activity programmes all the way through to elite competitions. This ultimately creates a powerful association between sport and products such as sugar-sweetened beverages and alcohol.  As a result, advertising and sponsorship from these industries have become so deeply embedded in sport that they are not only normalised but expected. To understand the scale of the issue, it is worth taking a closer look at some examples from recent sporting events.

Industry’s smoke and mirrors

First up, and front of mind over the last couple of weeks, is the 2026 Men’s FIFA World Cup. Just two days before the tournament kicked off, Ab InBev (the world’s largest brewer and parent company of Budweiser) announced that its global partnership agreement with FIFA, which grants it the title of ‘Official Beer Sponsor’ of the FIFA World Cup, had been extended to 2030. The company’s reach extends beyond football. Ab InBev own Corona, which became the first ever Olympic Games beer sponsor with a partnership beginning at the Paris 2024 Olympic Games and expected to continue until 2032.

As we know, such partnerships do more than sell products. When it comes to alcohol, they serve to associate these products with positive emotions, success and national pride. Ab InBev CEO, Michel Doukeris, explains this himself in an interview with CNBC saying: “Our brand goes very well with sports, those are moments where people are together with friends and family, where memories are built and the enjoyment that you have across sports is something that lasts forever in people’s minds.”

In other words, the partnership is about building long-term positive associations with the brand and, by extension, consuming alcohol. Thereby masking the truth of alcohol’s many harms and the fact that it is an addictive substance, a major cause of preventable premature death, and a Group 1 carcinogen linked to at least seven cancers.

To keep track of all the alcohol advertising taking place at the World Cup, Movendi International launched a global campaign to gather examples and develop a case study library exposing alcohol marketing during the tournament, which will be used for future research and advocacy.

No sporting event is safe

Big Alcohol isn’t the only industry capitalising on sporting events.

Junk food, soft drink and energy drink brands are doing the same, despite their products directly contributing to ill health. Viewers of the World Cup would have seen consistent on-pitch brand advertising of McDonalds whilst Coca-Cola is touted as the “official soft drinks partner” of the Commonwealth Games.

Even the Wimbledon Championships, which is known for minimal advertising, has fallen foul of promoting health-harming products. During this year’s tournament, viewers may have seen the beer brand Stella Artois and Lanson Champagne advertised as official partners.

Showing promotion of health-harming products the red card

Once you take the time to unpack the sponsorship and advertisements at sporting events, it’s hard to argue that we shouldn’t show them the red card.

History is on our side too. Not so long ago, throughout the 20th century, cigarette brands heavily dominated sports sponsorships from Formula 1 to football. Whilst promotions of “smoke-free” alternatives like nicotine pouches and vapes are still highly visible in some sports, significant progress has been made, with over 57 countries enforcing comprehensive bans on tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship primarily driven by the WHO’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control.

Encouragingly, momentum for change is now moving beyond tobacco. In 2024, Member States at the 77th World Health Assembly adopted a resolution on Strengthening health and well-being through sport events, calling on governments to limit the marketing of unhealthy products at sporting events and promote policies to reduce alcohol-related harm. This reflects a growing recognition that sport should support public health, not undermine it.

At its best, sport encourages us to move more, live healthier lives and reach our full potential. It is therefore worth asking: why are so many of the world’s biggest sporting events still being used to promote products that increase the risk of cancer and other diseases?

Today the Commons Health and Social Care Select Committee published a report on fixing the food environment as part of its food and weight management inquiry. Its message to Government is loud and clear: it is time to stand up to industry and move forward with a bold new approach to tackling obesity. 

Read the report (PDF).

The environments in which we live, work and shop play a major role in shaping our health, yet many people are surrounded by the promotion and availability of unhealthy food options. Addressing this is essential for cancer prevention – excess weight is a cause of at least 13 types of cancer and is the second biggest preventable cause of cancer in the UK after smoking. 

Many of the Committee’s recommendations are reflected in World Cancer Research Fund’s written evidence to the inquiry and, if implemented together, would help make the healthy choice the easy choice. In particular, we welcome the Committee’s recommendation that the healthy sales reporting policy should be introduced as soon as possible, with targets for major supermarkets set within the next 12 months and for the wider food industry by the end of Parliament. In practice, the policy would mean that large food businesses would be incentivised to have healthier products on their shelves and in promotions – leading to a potential reduction of obesity by around a fifth. We also strongly echo the Committee’s recommendation for the Government to exclude actors with a vested interest from discussions on the formation of policies on food, diet and obesity prevention.  

Overall, the report sets out a clear roadmap for fixing our broken food environment. As the UK prepares for a new Prime Minister, we urge them to demonstrate their commitment to prevention by taking forward these recommendations at pace. This is a vital opportunity to fix our food environment, tackle obesity and prevent cancer for future generations. 

World Cancer Research Fund International (WCRFI) has been in official relations with WHO since 2016. We attend the World Health Assembly (WHA) every year, engaging with WHO, Member States and global health policymakers to advance our cancer prevention recommendations through meetings, side events, and Assembly discussions.

This year, WCRFI led a statement on maternal, infant, and young child nutrition and co-sponsored four statements led by NCD Alliance (on the follow-up on the High-level Meeting on NCDs, global architecture reform, the proposed economics of health for all strategy, and primary health care).

>  Read all of our statements from WHA79.

But notably: this year’s WHA felt different. Many people reflected on this throughout the week — across civil society, WHO staff, Member States,and advocates alike. With the Assembly split between the Palais des Nations and WHO headquarter buildings, this year we weren’t congregated in the same spaces, and the corridor conversations (planned or improvised) and connections that usually shape a WHA week were harder to come by.

The volume of side events was also notably higher than in previous years, pulling people into separate corners of Geneva, from breakfast meetings through to evening receptions. Several people remarked it felt more like a UN General Assembly week than a WHA one.

But, despite these differences, the core of WHA remained the same: a collective group of people from around the world demonstrating their commitment to address pressing issues and advance health globally. It’s because of this that I always leave WHA with a little more hope. And for those of us working on cancer and NCD prevention, there was real progress to take away, alongside the challenges that remain.

WCRF International at WHA79 – Elaine Green, Interim Head of Policy & Public Affairs, and Kendra Chow, Senior Policy & Public Affairs Manager

Prevention in national cancer control planning

For the cancer agenda, the activities actually started a few days before WHA opened. Union for International Cancer Control (UICC) held their second Cancer Planners Forum in Geneva (13–15 May), bringing together over 120 participants from 54 countries — including 45 government-appointed cancer planners from 42 countries.

Our newly published advocacy brief, Strengthening National Cancer Control Plans: Putting Prevention at the Centre, was shared with attendees. The brief sets out a straightforward but important case: around 40% of cancers are preventable, yet only 30% of national cancer control plans include comprehensive prevention measures, and three-quarters remain largely unfunded.

Getting that evidence into the hands of the people who develop and implement national plans is a direct route to shifting how cancer control is approached at country level, and a great way to put these messages front-of-mind for policymakers ahead of WHA.

The economics of health

As mentioned, this year’s WHA week lived up to its predecessors’ reputation of being a busy one. One of the headline outcomes of WHA79 was the adoption of WHO’s Strategy on the Economics of Health for All (2026–2030). The strategy positions health as an investment rather than a cost, and calls for it to be integrated into economic, fiscal, and industrial policy—not treated as a concern for health ministries alone.

WCRF International co-signed a statement led by NCD Alliance in support of the strategy, alongside UICC, the World Heart Federation, the International Diabetes Federation, and others. We welcomed its foundations in equity, sustainability, and social participation, and called for stronger attention to commercial determinants of health.

The commercial determinants driving consumption of tobacco, alcohol, and unhealthy diets are increasing NCD rates globally, and any strategy on health economics that doesn’t address this gap is missing a significant part of the picture. Prevention advocates have long made the economic case for action; this strategy provides stronger footing for doing so across government.

Global health architecture reform: a missed opportunity on inclusion

Member States also agreed at WHA79 to establish a joint process to reform the global health architecture, with recommendations due at next year’s Assembly. The intent—a more coherent, better-resourced system that can respond to today’s health challenges—is a positive direction to move towards.

What is harder to reconcile is the decision to exclude civil society and people with lived experience from the Joint Task Force overseeing the process. As NCD Alliance noted, this contradicts commitments governments have already made under WHA Resolution 77.2 on social participation for Universal Health Coverage. Meaningful, equitable reform cannot be designed without the people most affected by the systems being at the table. We hope this is reconsidered as the process develops.

Misinformation, communication and Cancer Prevention Action Week

A pharmacovigilance resolution adopted at WHA79 flagged the spread of misinformation as an ongoing threat to public trust in health interventions — an issue that is extremely prevalent to cancer and cancer prevention, as much as any other health area. People are navigating a lot of conflicting information about cancer risk, and clear, evidence-based communication from trusted institutions matters.

June sees WCRF UK’s Cancer Prevention Action Week taking place and the theme – Science Not Fiction – is part of our response to that: grounded in the most comprehensive ongoing evidence synthesis on diet, weight, physical activity and cancer risk, and aimed at communicating what the evidence actually shows. Look out for next month’s blog for more information on the campaign.

Investment, implementation, and impact

As we move further down the road after securing the commitments in the Political Declaration on NCDs and mental health, and need to move closer to implementing them, the focus is shifting to what actually makes impact possible. Side events and conversations throughout WHA79 reflected this shift, with investment increasingly in focus ahead of September’s Third International Financing Dialogue on NCDs in Manila.

That Dialogue is the next critical moment for turning commitment into action. As NCD Alliance has underlined, the gap between what was promised and what is happening on the ground is fundamentally a financing gap. And post-WHA, the broader challenge remains getting these conversations beyond the health sector: into finance ministries, food systems, planning decisions, and all the other spaces that shape the environments in which cancer risk accumulates.

Other strong areas of focus across the week included tackling the obesity crisis, as well as growing recognition of mental health and its interconnectedness with NCDs—further illuminating the need to engage in multi-sectoral action to address these complex, multifactorial issues.

The pathway from investment to implementation to impact is not an easy one. What has been made clear this week is there is much work to be done—particularly in activating policy levers that can deliver on the Political Declaration’s commitments, while also being achievable and sustainable. This is where WCRFI plans to work more closely with governments on implementing NCCPs, with prevention serving as a strong foundation, to support these aims and continue movement along the path towards positive impact for cancer and NCDs worldwide.

• Read WCRF International’s advocacy brief, Strengthening National Cancer Control Plans: Putting Prevention at the Centre
• Read WCRF International’s statements delivered at World Health Assembly

Coming into my new role as Interim Head of Policy and Public Affairs ¹ at World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) International, I was immediately faced with trying to understand what ultra-processed foods (UPFs) are and how they might, or might not, contribute to cancer risk.

The harms caused by UPFs have been a growing concern in public health, cancer research and nutrition policy over recent years. The increasing number of scientific publications such as Kevin Hall’s 2019 research and the recent Lancet series on UPFs and human health have further amplified and elevated attention to this critical issue. However, to be certain of the risks between UPFs and cancer, there is a need to identify, review and judge the strength of the evidence related to these potential links.

Foods can go through many different types of processing, not all of which are unhealthy. From common practices such as baking homemade bread and pasteurising milk, to commercial and industrial production which breaks foods down and recombines them, often using artificial preservatives and ingredients that aren’t normally found in a kitchen.

In 2010, the NOVA system of food classification was introduced and is now a common tool to categorise foods according to their level of processing:

• Unprocessed and minimally processed foods, containing no added fats, salt, sugar or other additives. Examples include frozen fruit and vegetables, and pasteurised milk.
• Processed culinary ingredients. These are ingredients that aren’t created to be eaten alone and are often used alongside foods in group 1 such as oils, sugars and salt.
• Processed food, where a product from group 2 – like salt, sugar, fat or vinegar – is added to minimally-processed foods. Examples include tinned goods such as lentils and beans, salted nuts and cheese.
• Ultra-processed foods. Many of the foods we consume daily fall into this category: pre-packaged meals (and yes, I have to admit, I am partial to an easy-to-cook ready meal on a Friday night), industrialised bread, sweets, soft drinks and sweetened yoghurt.

Why is this important and what does it mean for health?

Across the world, the average share of UPFs in a person’s diet ranges from 9% in Iran to 60% in the USA². Recent UK data shows that 57% of the calories British people eat come from UPFs: a figure that rises, worryingly, to 63.5% for children aged 1.5-11 years and 68% for adolescents aged between 12-18 years. Furthermore, there are critical health equity dimensions to the consumption of UPFs, with greater exposure to UPFs often being found among lower-income, marginalised or socially disadvantaged populations.

The increasing consumption of UPFs is a trend that is being seen not just in high-income countries, but also in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), leading to a double burden of malnutrition, with many LMICs being faced with challenges of both undernutrition and overweight and obesity at the same time³.

Alongside the growing body of evidence suggesting that UPFs are harmful to health, these trends are concerning. Combining the steady increase of UPF production and consumption in both high-income and lower-income countries, the way in which producers of UPFs undermine food systems and dietary patterns (by displacing minimally processed foods and being more affordable than freshly prepared meals), and the impact of UPFs on pollution, greenhouse gas emissions and biodiversity loss, it is abundantly clear that the growing consumption of UPFs requires urgent policy action.

But what is the link between UPFs and cancer?

Well, the honest answer is that, at the moment, we are not entirely sure. The recent Lancet review of available evidence found some indications that an ultra-processed dietary pattern increased risk of a range of chronic diseases, including cancer-related morbidity and mortality. A small number of studies found an association between the consumption of UPFs and increased overall incidence of cancer.

However, to be certain of the risks between UPFs and cancer, there is a need to identify, review and judge the strength of the evidence related to the potential links between UPFs and cancer risk. This includes the evidence related to the biological mechanisms that may be driving these links. It may also be the case that UPFs, in and of themselves, do not increase our risk of cancer directly but increase the risk of things we know do. For example, the Lancet study found a clear association between UPFs and overweight or obesity – and we know that people living with overweight or obesity have an increased risk of at least 13 different types of cancer. We also know that one way to prevent cancer is to avoid processed meat as we highlight in our 10 Cancer Prevention Recommendations.

What have I learned so far?

In my second week in my new role, I was fortunate enough to attend a policy forum on UPFs organised by Imperial College London. The forum set out a clear case for action and highlighted some excellent examples of good practice in national policy implementation to reduce consumption of UPFs. Two things struck me during this forum:

• The scale of the challenge we are facing: from the force of social media algorithms that dramatically increase exposure to UPF marketing practices, to the power large industry holds over food production and manufacturing processes, and the challenges of implementing regulatory policies that tackle rather than exacerbate health inequities.
• That we can do something about it: the UPF Policy Forum also highlighted progress being made to emphasise the contents of food to consumers (such as high amounts of sugar, salt or fat) using front-of-packing labels. These advances, as demonstrated in the Americas, are a WHO Best Buy policy that can improve consumers’ understanding and choices of foods they eat, as well as push food producers to improve the quality of foods they are making.

My third observation, or question, coming out of the UPF Policy Forum, however, was ‘what does this mean for me in my new role at WCRF International?’ I can see that there are some linkages between UPFs and cancer, but these are in no way conclusive. How can I legitimately argue that by reducing consumption of UPFs you can reduce your risk of cancer when there are still so many unanswered questions? And how can I advocate for policy change without robust scientific evidence?

The good news is that this evidence is coming

WCRF International’s Global Cancer Update Programme, CUP Global, has this year included a systematic review of evidence on UPFs and cancer risk. While there is no guarantee that this review will lead to a clear conclusion on the linkages between UPFs and cancer, it will certainly add more evidence to help inform the debate.

With that in mind, I’m looking forward to July when our CUP Global Expert Panel will come together and review the latest evidence on this. So, if you want to keep informed on the links between UPFs and cancer risk, keep watching this space. Or even better, follow us on LinkedIn and sign up to our monthly e-news for the latest updates.

Notes and references:

¹ I’ll be covering this role while Kate Oldridge-Turner is on maternity leave.

² Monteiro C, Louzada M, Steele-Martinez E et al. Ultra-processed foods and human health: the main thesis and evidence. The Lancet, 2025; 406, 266702684.

³ Popkin B, Corvalan C, Grummer-Strawn L Dynamics of the double burden of malnutrition and the changing nutrition reality. The Lancet, 2019; 395, 65-74.

The year is 2013. Macklemore and Katy Perry are on the charts. Children everywhere are about to lose their minds for Frozen. Most of the population has never even heard of a coronavirus.

In London, WCRF International’s recently established Policy & Public Affairs team has been hard at work developing the NOURISHING policy framework.

Following the success of NOURISHING, in 2018 the EU-funded CO-CREATE project enabled WCRF International to develop the MOVING policy framework and database, which outlined priority actions to promote physical activity.

Fast-forward to 2026, and we are now leading an exciting programme of work to update these tools: we envisage integrating policies on nutrition and physical activity into a single set of tools.

Alongside, we will incorporate policies on alcohol consumption and breastfeeding and infant nutrition to align with our current efforts to support population-level adherence to WCRF’s Cancer Prevention Recommendations.

As we embark on this project, we are reflecting on how our tools can drive policy action as effectively as possible.

How can our policy tools support action on prevention?

WCRF International designed the NOURISHING and MOVING tools to support our core policy aim: to help governments and policymakers around the world take effective action on preventing cancer and other non-communicable diseases (NCDs).

Since their publication, NOURISHING and MOVING have been cited hundreds of times in academic literature and referenced by national governments and organisations including the World Health Organization, the Food and Agriculture Organization and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Their uptake has shown how these tools can support change across the policy process.

Policy frameworks provide a suite of actions to advocate for and implement. Given our focus on prevention, our frameworks have encompassed a whole-of-society and whole-of-government approach to supporting healthier populations, from retail environments, to urban planning, to marketing restrictions.

As well as providing policy options, policy frameworks can be used to monitor and benchmark policy progress. In 2023, our team used the NOURISHING and MOVING frameworks to carry out a benchmarking process in the European region, assessing progress on nutrition and physical activity in 30 countries.

By presenting the range of actions governments can take, policy frameworks provide a yardstick to identify countries’ strengths as well as priority areas for action.

The NOURISHING and MOVING frameworks were also used to guide the development of complementary policy databases. These databases catalogue real-world examples of policies from around the globe. For governments and advocates, learning from other nations’ experiences can be extremely valuable.

Consider sugar-sweetened beverage taxation, a policy measure which has now been implemented in over 100 countries, typically with the aim of reducing sugar consumption in the population.

A government looking to implement a sugar-sweetened beverage tax in their own context can learn from the example of Mexico, who implemented a flat excise tax of 1 peso per litre, or South Africa, who structured their tax based on sugar content.

They may be interested in knowing about the policy process that led to successful adoption in Chile, or how the measure impacted economic outcomes in the UK. Policy databases like NOURISHING and MOVING can help provide this information.

What’s next?

Over a decade after the launch of our first policy framework, the policy environment for prevention of cancer and other NCDs has evolved. Emerging issues such as ultra-processed foods, GLP-1s, climate change and air pollution are taking centre stage.

Governments are increasingly focused on policy integration and coherence in a bid to take effective action on complex issues. Advocates are exploring co-benefits and trade-offs with other agendas in order to build effective coalitions, particularly in the context of shrinking resources for public health.

Questions we are contemplating as we begin this project include:

• How can we best integrate a range of modifiable risk factors – nutrition, physical activity, alcohol consumption and breastfeeding – to reflect WCRF’s Cancer Prevention Recommendations?
• What types of information will be most valuable to our intended audiences, and how can we effectively mobilise these tools to support evidence-informed prevention policy?
• How should we navigate between depth and breadth in our database, weighing up the advantages of incorporating a wide range of policies from many countries, versus providing more detailed information around policy content, process and impact?
• How can we best incorporate co-benefits and trade-offs into our tools, acknowledging that actions that support cancer prevention can have synergies with agendas like climate change, health equity and mental health?
• Can our policy tools make space for and even drive innovation, as well as providing examples of precedent?
• How can we include country context in a way that helps our users understand what is likely to be feasible or effective in their own setting?
• What opportunities do AI innovations present for for expanding our coverage while maintaining the quality of our resources?

As we move forward with the next phase, we will engage experts and knowledge users in different regions and sectors to understand how we can best position these updated tools for use and take stock of the existing ecosystem of policy tools to ensure our work complements the efforts of other organisations.

If you would like to find out more about the policy framework and database update project, or see how you can get involved, please reach out to Chloe at c.cliffordastbury@wcrf.org.

Rates of childhood obesity have increased from 4% to 20% over the past 50 years. From a cancer prevention perspective, this is worrying news: childhood obesity often continues into adulthood, and our work shows that excess body weight in adults is linked to at least 13 different types of cancer. What’s more, our research has shown that higher body weight in childhood, adolescence and young adulthood is linked to an increased risk of colorectal cancer in later life.

To maintain a healthy weight, children need more support to eat a nutritious diet. Policy can help foster systems and structures that make healthy diets easier and, for kids, schools are a great place to start.

The morning bell

My apartment in London overlooks a primary school attended by about 130 students. Waiting for my morning bus to WCRF’s offices, I see parents accompanying their children along the bustling road to the school gates. From a nutrition perspective, this particular route must feel a bit like running the gauntlet: a rotating billboard in view of the bus stop advertises burgers and fries, while every other business sells fast food. UNICEF’s Feeding Profit report, published last year, highlights this as a global problem.

To tackle the food environment around schools, several local authorities in the UK have chosen to restrict the opening of new fast food restaurants around schools. Cities such as Leeds and Manchester have opted to either reduce the number of new outlets near schools or prohibit them entirely.

Elsewhere in the world, governments have chosen to implement school-focused marketing restrictions. Latin American countries are leaders in this space, with countries like Chile and Mexico banning unhealthy foods from being advertised in schools. In 2021, the local congress in Lima, Peru went further, passing a law to prohibit the marketing of unhealthy foods within 200 metres of schools.

Lunchtime

From my own childhood in Canada, memories from the school cafeteria include slices of pizza, chocolate chip cookies and a freezer selling ice cream and popsicles. Although we occasionally managed to bargain for a few dollars for pizza, my parents worried that this menu wasn’t healthy enough. We mostly packed our own, a task added to already busy mornings.

Comparing notes with my partner who grew up in Sweden – where school lunches have been free for all children regardless of income for over 70 years – he remembers a self-service soup and salad bar to go with the daily mains. That didn’t stop students from complaining – tarragon fish day was particularly disliked. In high school, they would occasionally head over to the local pizzeria for lunch when their pocket money stretched to it.

Our memories reflect not only the cross-cutting appeal of pizza but the variation in school meals, even in high-income contexts. Until last year, Canada was still the only G7 country without a school food plan. However, we are not the only ones that have struggled to provide schoolchildren with nutritious lunches. Only 37% of school meal programs have an objective to prevent overweight and obesity, and wealthier countries are more likely to provide unhealthy foods.

Meanwhile, school food superstars like Brazil show us what can be done, successfully establishing legislation for coverage, quality, and procurement practices, emphasising local foods. In Japan, procurement policies also favour local producers, and pair school meals with food and nutrition education.

Recess

Beyond lunchtime, countries are developing innovative approaches to improving the quality of snacks sold on school premises. In Chile, a suite of policy measures aiming to reduce the consumption of foods high in calories, sugar, sodium or saturated fat has included banning their sale in schools. This has led to an impressive reduction in the sale of these unhealthy foods in school kiosks.

In January of this year, the World Health Organization published its new guideline providing evidence-based recommendations to support countries in creating healthy school food environments. This cites evidence from countries like Chile, as well as measures to directly provide children with healthy alternatives, like the European Union’s school scheme to support the distribution of milk, fruit and vegetables. Meanwhile, the School Meals Coalition, a global multi-partner initiative, facilitates country commitments to initiate or strengthen school food programmes, and fosters collaborations to support their efforts.

From the morning bell to lunchtime to recess, every part of the school day offers an opportunity to shape healthier futures. World Obesity Day calls on us to advocate for stronger food policy and equitable access to nutritious foods. If we get this right in schools, we don’t just change what children eat today – we help reduce their cancer risk tomorrow.

We commend the UK Government for setting out an ambitious 10-year strategy with a strong focus on survival, innovation, and patient experience.

Yet the Plan misses a chance to put prevention front and centre, with stronger alcohol policy, breastfeeding protection, and a dedicated focus on the modifiable risk factors that drive cancer

A bold ambition on survival and care

We particularly welcome the Government’s bold target that 75% of people diagnosed with cancer from 2035 will be cancer-free or living well five years after diagnosis – a genuine step change in ambition. The Plan’s emphasis on earlier diagnosis, reducing emergency presentations, expanding evidence-based screening, and improving access to innovative treatments has the potential to deliver meaningful improvements for patients across England.

We also welcome commitments to improve patient experience and outcomes, including personalised care, better coordination, and stronger accountability for delivery through a reformed National Cancer Board.

Progress on prevention – but a missed opportunity to go further

We welcome the Plan’s commitments on cancer prevention, including action to crack down on the illegal use of sunbeds and harmful UV exposure, progress towards a smoke-free generation, and expanded access to HPV vaccination as part of the ambition to eliminate cervical cancer. These are important, evidence-based interventions that will prevent cancers and reduce future pressure on the health system.

However, prevention deserves greater prominence. New global evidence shows that up to four in ten cancers worldwide are linked to preventable causes. Tackling the lifestyle and environmental factors that increase cancer risk is one of the most effective and affordable ways to prevent cancer in the long term.

Crucially, modifiable risk factors are not evenly distributed. Tobacco use, harmful alcohol consumption, unhealthy diets and obesity disproportionately affect people in lower socio-economic groups, driving stark and persistent inequalities in cancer incidence, survival and mortality. Strong, population-level prevention policies are therefore essential not only to reduce cancer overall, but to narrow health inequalities and ensure the benefits of progress are shared fairly.

We believe the Plan would have benefitted from a dedicated chapter on prevention, helping to drive a necessary mindset shift and embed the principle that diet, alcohol, and breastfeeding policies are cancer policies.

Action on alcohol and breastfeeding is lacking

The Plan does not expansively build on the wider prevention measures announced in the Government’s 10 Year Health Plan, particularly in relation to alcohol policy. Alcohol remains a leading avoidable cause of cancer, yet the Plan does not commit to minimum unit pricing (MUP) or restrictions on alcohol advertising and marketing, including where it reaches children and young people – among the most effective and evidence-based tools for reducing population-level alcohol harm and cancer risk.

We also note the absence of strengthened action to protect breastfeeding, including full compliance with the International Code of Marketing of Breast-milk Substitutes. Breastfeeding reduces cancer risk for mothers and improves long-term health outcomes for children, and stronger implementation of the Code should form part of a comprehensive, life-course approach to cancer prevention.

Partnerships with food manufacturers must also be approached with caution, given past experience of policy dilution. Where voluntary approaches fall short, Government must not shy away from mandatory measures. Strong governance, transparency, and protection from undue commercial influence are essential to ensure prevention policies deliver for public health.

Biomedical innovation matters but it is not enough

We are pleased to see the Plan’s commitment to biomedical prevention, including continued rollout of the HPV vaccine, trials of preventative vaccines such as LungVax, and plans to accelerate uptake of GLP-1 medicines for those who clinically need them. These innovations are hugely important and represent real progress in reducing cancer risk and improving outcomes.

But vaccines and medicines alone are not sufficient. We must also tackle the environments that make us sick. We cannot continue to treat people only to send them back to the same food, alcohol, and physical environments that drove ill health in the first place. Population-level prevention policies remain essential to reducing cancer incidence at scale.

Crucially, prevention is not only about avoiding diagnosis. It also supports survival and quality of life, contributing directly to living well with and beyond cancer. Good nutrition, physical activity, and maintaining a healthy weight are fundamental to recovery, rehabilitation, and long-term wellbeing. Prevention and survivorship are not competing priorities – they are mutually reinforcing.

Digital innovation as a driver of prevention

We welcome the ambition to harness digital innovation through the NHS App. By 2028, the App will allow patients to manage screening invitations, appointments, treatment plans, and prehabilitation, with personalised prevention advice drawing on genomic, lifestyle, and wearable data.

This creates a major opportunity to establish the NHS App as a trusted, accessible source of cancer prevention information, supporting people to understand and act on behaviours that can influence cancer risk over their lifetime. We would welcome the opportunity to contribute evidence-based, tried and tested prevention resources, developed and evaluated for public audiences, to support this ambition and ensure alignment with the best available science.

Prehabilitation, rehabilitation and supportive oncology

We strongly welcome the Plan’s focus on prehabilitation, rehabilitation, and supportive oncology, including dietary and physical activity advice, psychological support, and acute oncology for those with more complex needs. The evidence is clear: these interventions improve treatment tolerance, recovery, and long-term outcomes. We believe the ambition should be for these services to be available to all patients, where appropriate, as standard.

Research and the cancer workforce

Research and the cancer workforce will be central to delivering the Plan’s ambitions. While we acknowledge the focus on accelerating clinical research and innovation, there is a clear opportunity to strengthen investment in cancer prevention research, including implementation research on modifiable risk factors. Healthcare professionals must also be supported with the time, training, and tools to deliver prevention, behaviour change, and survivorship support alongside treatment.

Children and young people

We welcome the Plan’s commitment to improving nutrition for children and young people undergoing cancer treatment in acute settings. Good nutrition is fundamental to treatment tolerance, recovery, and survival. We hope this approach will be extended to all patients, and that public procurement across health settings consistently meets the highest nutritional and sustainability standards through the upcoming NHS food standards review.

Matching survival ambition with prevention action

We welcome the ambition and scope of the National Cancer Plan. The integration of prehabilitation, rehabilitation, supportive oncology, digital innovation, and prevention advice into the cancer pathway is a significant step forward.

However, there remains a missed opportunity to embed prevention at the heart of the Plan, through stronger alcohol policy, breastfeeding protection, and a dedicated focus on the modifiable risk factors that drive cancer incidence.

A Plan that matches its ambition on survival with bold, population-level prevention action will reduce cancer incidence, improve outcomes, and deliver a financially sustainable cancer strategy for generations to come.

We stand ready to work with Government, healthcare professionals, and partners to help make this ambition a reality.

> Read the National Cancer Plan on the DHSC website

It has long been established that junk food advertising drives consumption of unhealthy food and drink, shaping preferences from a young age and contributing to overweight and obesity.

The strength of the evidence base is perhaps best corroborated by the enormous advertising budgets of unhealthy food and drink companies. If advertising didn’t pay off, why would Coca-Cola allocate a whopping $5 billion to their worldwide advertising budget in 2024?

Restricting junk food advertising is therefore a powerful and proven public health measure. Yet, most recently, you may have seen measured responses from public health advocates in the UK, including World Cancer Research Fund, upon the introduction of long-awaited junk food advertising restrictions in January 2026.

Marketing regulations can underdeliver

The bottom line is that whilst the UK’s restrictions mark a step forward in protecting children’s health at a time when obesity rates continue to rise, they have been weakened and delayed by industry influence – most notably through the introduction of a sweeping brand exemption. This significantly undermines the policy in two key ways. First, it allows brands that are synonymous with foods high in fat, salt and sugar (HFSS) to continue being advertised – think the famous Golden Arches. Second, the lack of brand restrictions enables companies to promote entire HFSS product ranges, just not individual products. Ultimately this preserves brand visibility and influence while circumventing the spirit of the regulations.

The brand exemption is not the only weakness of the advertising restrictions. Work on this policy began as far back as 2018, and in the years since, the marketing landscape has evolved dramatically. Simply put, the regulations are not a match for the rapidly changing marketing landscape. For example, direct marketing channels, such as email and text messaging, remain unchecked, allowing unhealthy food and drink companies to continue targeting consumers.

The unseen cost of delays and dilution

The unfortunate tale of industry influence is not unique to the UK. Globally, efforts to curb the scourge of junk food on society are denied, diluted, derailed and delayed by industry.

Marketing restrictions are difficult to get over the line. In the UK, the policy was subject to five separate consultations and four delays to its rollout. That is an immense amount of government time, effort and resources. Moreover, the burden it places on the public health sector, which often operate under capacity constraints, must be acknowledged.

We also need to recognise that obesity, a key risk factor for cancer, is linked to deprivation. In many countries, those living in the most deprived areas are more likely to be living with obesity compared to those in the most affluent communities. Delays or failures to implement effective policies therefore disproportionately impact those who are already most vulnerable.

Industry opposition at full throttle

The resistance we see to advertising restrictions can partly be explained by the fact that marketing is not a peripheral commercial function. Instead, it sits at the very core of food and drink businesses, playing a pivotal role in building brand value, customer loyalty and long-term profitability.

Marketing restrictions are also unusually visible. Unlike reformulation targets or nutrient thresholds, which operate largely behind the scenes, advertising bans are immediately noticeable. They can also be drawn into wider debates around personal responsibility, censorship and creativity – making the more contested and politically charged. They tend to hit a nerve.

Recognition of these issues is not a justification for inaction. The reality is that companies by their very nature are required to innovate, and they can do so in a way that supports public health rather than undermining it.

Action must go beyond the status quo

Let’s be clear, no one is suggesting that junk food marketing restrictions alone will solve the obesity crisis. However, the version we’ve seen introduced in the UK will most certainly underdeliver, especially given the restrictions don’t sit within a broader framework of measures designed to improve the nation’s diet yet. Countries in Latin America, including Chile and Mexico, have taken more holistic approaches which embed marketing restrictions within a wider set of measures including mandatory warning labels and robust school food standards

But when governments introduce policies that appear ambitious on paper but lack the strength to deliver in practice, they risk entrenching the status quo while giving the impression of action. This pattern is not unique to food. Similar delays and dilutions are seen across alcohol, gambling and other health-harming industries, where commercial interests routinely take priority over public health.

Ultimately, the question is not what needs to be done, but what governments are willing to do to protect public health.

After years of delays, a law to ban ads for unhealthy food and drink before 9pm on TV and across online platforms, will start.

Commenting on the ban, Dr Giota Mitrou, Executive Director of Research and Science at World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) International, said:

“Marketing is a well-established driver of consumption of unhealthy foods, and children – who are the primary targets of junk food advertising by large corporations – are particularly vulnerable. These long-awaited restrictions therefore mark an important step forward in protecting children’s health.

“However, we must recognise the fact that these measures have not only been severely delayed, but also significantly weakened by broad exemptions for brand advertising.

“The scale of childhood obesity crisis demands greater and more far-reaching action. The latest data shows that 10.5% of children in Reception and 22.2% of children in Year 6 are living with obesity, with prevalence more than double in the most deprived areas compared with the least deprived.

“The UK government must expand the range of products in scope of the ban, removing brand exemptions, and extend protections to the outdoor environment. We must not let large corporations’ water down and undermine efforts to give all children the healthiest start.

World Cancer Research Fund remains committed to working with the government to address obesity, which is a cause of at least at least 13 types of cancer.”

Delay to the junk food marketing restrictions

In 2020 – as part of its Obesity Strategy – the government under Boris Johnson promised to implement a ban on products that were high in fat, salt and sugar (HFSS) online and before 9pm on TV, saying it would come into force by 2023.

However, under pressure from industry, the enforcement was delayed while a further review was undertaken.

These delays mean that today’s implementation will be three years later than originally promised, and severely weakened.

Research has demonstrated that children eat significantly more calories in a day, after watching just 5 minutes of junk food advertising.

Building Momentum report

In 2020, World Cancer Research fund produced its Building Momentum report showing the lessons of implementing robust restrictions of food and non-alcoholic beverage marketing to children