Reducing taxes on healthy foods, such as vegetables and fruits, and ensuring compliance with food supply standards in schools are some of the priorities highlighted in a new report.
The document, which evaluated the performance of public policies related to healthy eating, also recommends expanding the reformulation plan for food products, involving restoration.
According to the report, released by the General Directorate of Health (DGS), to guarantee the application of the existing guidelines for the supply of food in schools, a model that includes more supervision must be defined.
The authors of the document also recommend the definition of a nutritional profile model that serves as the basis for implementing measures that promote healthy eating environments and propose a modification to the Value Added Tax (VAT) code.
The intention is “to include other criteria (s) for the attribution of VAT rates, in addition to the essentiality criterion, that consider the nutritional profile of foods and / or their framework in the field of healthy eating.”
The inclusion of the program to promote healthy eating in the basic portfolio of Primary Health Care services and the definition of indicators to periodically monitor food consumption, nutritional status, and health outcomes related to food and nutrition .
The specialists also suggest an improvement of the workforce in the area of nutrition and public health, adjusting the ratio of nutritionists in Primary Health Care and integrating at least one of these professionals in each Public Health Unit at the level of Primary Health Care .
Including the most vulnerable population groups, namely the elderly, pregnant women, children, adolescents and immigrants, as priority action groups in national programs in the area of nutrition and healthy eating is another recommendation.
The document recalls that inadequate nutrition is one of the main preventable causes of chronic non-communicable diseases, namely obesity, oncological diseases, cerebrovascular diseases and type 2 diabetes mellitus, and emphasizes that the most recent data from the Global Burden Disease, 2019, show that “in Portugal, inadequate eating habits are among the five risk factors that most determine the loss of years of healthy life and mortality”.
“Given the weight that dietary risk factors have on the burden of disease in Portugal, similarly to what has been seen in other European countries, it is necessary to implement measures that promote a healthy diet, that is, measures aimed at create healthy food environments, ”the experts write.
They emphasize that Portugal has tried to respond and has followed international recommendations, applying “a wide range of measures aimed at creating healthy food environments”, and they give as an example the special tax on sugary drinks, legislation that introduces restrictions on the advertising of food intended for children and the regulation of the food supply in different public spaces (for example, educational institutions and the National Health Service).
More than half of the Portuguese population (56%) does not comply with the recommendation of the World Health Organization (WHO) to consume more than 400 g / day of fruits and vegetables, according to data from the latest National Survey of Food and Physical Activity (2015- 2016).
Data from the latest National Health Survey (2019), published by the National Institute of Statistics (INE), reveal that 53.6% of the Portuguese adult population is overweight (pre-obesity or obesity), with obesity affecting 1, 5 million people (16.9%).
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