As Australia battles an obesity crisis, experts warn labelling food as ‘healthy’ and ‘unhealthy’ can lead to damaging eating habits.

Their warnings come as Deakin University publishes a national scorecard outlining recommendations for supermarkets to improve their policies and practices surrounding nutrition.

The Inside Our Supermarket report highlighted five key recommendations for supermarkets to improve the healthiness of their stores.

Lead author of the report Professor Gary Sacks says supermarkets are not doing enough to “keep customer’s trolleys healthy.” He says Australia should adopt a framework similar to the UK.

“The UK has already regulated that checkouts have to be healthy,” he says.

Professor Sacks says as of next year, the UK will remove all price promotions on unhealthy products.

Accredited dietitian Claire Gasper of Diet Free Me, says categorising food as ‘healthy’ or ‘unhealthy’ does not allow people to form healthy relationships with food.

The self-described ‘non-diet dietitian’ says initiatives that label food as ‘bad’ or ‘unhealthy’ excludes the other ways it is involved in people’s lives aside from nutrition.

She says people should eat to fuel and satisfy their bodies but it is perfectly normal to eat food simply for enjoyment.

The Australian Government’s Guide to Healthy Eating is used to demonstrate what foods should be consumed in a healthy balanced diet.

Mrs Gasper says mainstream messaging like this can lead to shame and frustration in people when they do eat the ‘unhealthy’ food.

Accredited dietitian and founder of Diet Wise Sonya Douglas says messaging surrounding food can be inaccessible to neurodivergent people.

She says many people with Autism and ADHD will have a series of safe foods they choose to eat. For these people, eating certain foods outside their safe foods may cause sensory issues that lead to distress.

Mrs Douglas says parents of neurodivergent children may feel shame for feeding their children ‘unhealthy’ safe foods.
She says the messaging surrounding food should be reframed to reduce the shame that may often lead to disordered eating.

Professor Gary Slacks says supermarkets need to promote nutritious food and the Inside Our Supermarket report reflects this.

However, dietitian Claire Gasper says food exists on a spectrum, and labelling it under the blanket terms of ‘healthy’ and ‘unhealthy’ may not capture the nuance of food.