Area deprivation, screen time and consumption of food and drink high in fat salt and sugar (HFSS) in young people: results from a cross-sectional study in the UK.

Objectives: To investigate associations between deprivation in young people and consumption of foods high in fat, salt and sugar (HFSS), screen time exposure and health knowledge.

Design: An online cross-sectional survey with people aged 11-19 years in the UK, where participants reported consumption behaviours across 13 HFSS and two non-HFSS groups; screen time for commercial television and streaming services; and knowledge of health conditions and their links to obesity.

Setting: UK PARTICIPANTS: A total of 3348 young people aged 11-19 years across the UK.

Main Outcome Measures: The study assessed the consumption behaviours, commercial screen time exposure and the health knowledge of 3348 people aged 11-19 years. Multivariate binary regression analysis, controlling for age and gender, was performed.

Results: Deprivation level was associated with increases in consumption of six of the HFSS products including energy drinks (OR: 2.943, p<0.001) and sugary drinks (OR: 1.938, p<0.001) and a reduction in consumption in the two non-HFSS products included in the study, fruit (OR: 0.668, p=0.004) and vegetables (OR: 0.306, p<0.001). Deprivation was associated with high weekly screen time of both television (OR: 2.477, p<0.001) and streaming (OR: 1.679, p=0.001). Health knowledge was also associated with deprivation. There was lower awareness of the association of obesity and cancer (OR: 0.697, p=0.003), type 2 diabetes (OR: 0.64, p=0.004) and heart disease (OR: 0.519, p<0.001) in the most deprived.

Conclusions: Young people from the more deprived areas of the UK were more likely to consume a range of HFSS products, report increased exposure to HFSS advertising and have a poorer awareness of health conditions associated with overweight and obesity. The findings suggest that population-level measures addressing childhood obesity should account for consumption patterns among different groups of children and young people and the factors that may influence these.