Government-led programs attempting to curb childhood obesity by educating parents do not work, an international study published Thursday concluded, and researchers are calling for policies that prioritize society-wide solutions.

Obesity is a major health crisis with more than one in eight people globally now obese, according to the World Health Organization. By 2050, nearly 60% of adults and one third of children are predicted to be obese.

Hoping to address the problem, governments across the world have launched programs to raise awareness among new parents about the importance of a balanced diet and a healthy lifestyle.

A new study published in The Lancet medical journal compiled the results from 17 trials covering more than 9,000 toddlers in eight developed countries: Australia, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, the United Kingdom, the United States and Sweden.

The content of the programs often varied. Some involved indoor or outdoor training sessions while others used awareness campaigns to emphasize the importance of nutrition and exercise or highlight the risks of too much screen time.

But by the time the children turned two, their body mass index was similar to those of infants whose parents had not participated in any such program.

“Our finding that the interventions were not effective is surprising and discouraging,” the international team of health researchers wrote in the study.

“Obesity is in large part driven by environmental and socio-economic factors that individuals are unable to change,” lead study author Kylie Hunter of the University of Sydney said in a statement.

“Parents play a vital role, but our study highlights that they cannot be expected to reduce childhood obesity levels alone,” she added.

“We need to see coordinated policies which improve affordability of healthy foods, increase access to green spaces, and regulate unhealthy food marketing to tackle childhood obesity.”

The researchers cautioned that the data about two-year-olds may not tell the full story, and future research will focus on data relating to older children.

© 2025 AFP