Nutrition in schools — outdated guidelines need updating

To the Editor: The National Healthy School Canteens (NHSC) project commenced in 2008 to help provide guidelines for healthier food and drink choices in Australian schools. At their core, the guidelines seek to restrict the availability of poor food choices by encouraging the preferential availability of healthy options. These guidelines should ensure the translation of health research and national health curriculum into practice. However, the current NHSC guidelines are inadequate and fall short of their aims as they rate foods only on energy, fat and sodium, and disregard the sugar content of commercially available foods.