Food and drink high in fat, sugar and salt - out of home advertising restrictions: rapid evidence review

Methods

This work involved three key phases:

• Evaluating policy documents and other key sources of online published evidence where OOH advertising restrictions have already been implemented.
• Identifying and evaluating other key relevant sources of information, including grey and academic literature.
• Conversations with representatives from local governments in the UK with a forthcoming or implemented policy and conversations with industry and advocacy groups.

Search strategy

Due to the time constraints of the project, formal database searches were not run. Key sources were initially provided by policy colleagues. Between June and September 2024, reference lists of relevant published literature were scanned to identify other sources of information. Searches were also conducted online to identify published policy documents, which were also scanned for relevant sources of evidence.

Inclusion and exclusion criteria

Both qualitative and quantitative evidence, published within the last five years to June 2024, was included in this evidence review. Published or grey literature met the eligibility criteria if the document contained evidence of a planned or implemented policy relating to OOH advertising restrictions of HFSS food/drink in the UK. Documents included in the review could contain published or draft policies, evidence evaluating the strengths and/or weaknesses of policy implementation, or information that could directly inform implementation of a similar policy in Scotland. In the case of published evaluations, outcomes included the effectiveness of the policy, opposition to the policy and the experiences of policy implementation by people affected by the policy (e.g. shareholders, local community, industry).

Although useful for background and context, documents focused on non-OOH advertising restrictions of HFSS products, for example, TV advertising or price promotion restrictions were excluded from the review. In addition, evidence that focused solely on exposure to HFSS advertising was excluded due to the evidence not being directly related to an advertising policy, for example, investigating differences in exposure by socioeconomic status. Finally, documents were excluded if they were based on policies outside of the UK, or if the document was not written in English.

Thirteen documents met the inclusion criteria. Annex 2 contains further information on these publications.