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Changes in the number of new takeaway food outlets associated with adoption of management zones around schools: A natural experimental evaluation in England

Rahilly, John; Amies-Cull, Ben; Chang, Michael; Cummins, Steven; Derbyshire, Daniel; Hassan, Suzan; Huang, Yuru; ... Burgoine, Thomas; + view all (2024) Changes in the number of new takeaway food outlets associated with adoption of management zones around schools: A natural experimental evaluation in England. SSM - Population Health , 26 , Article 101646. 10.1016/j.ssmph.2024.101646. Green open access

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Abstract

By the end of 2017, 35 local authorities (LAs) across England had adopted takeaway management zones (or “exclusion zones”) around schools as a means to curb proliferation of new takeaways. In this nationwide, natural experimental study, we evaluated the impact of management zones on takeaway retail, including unintended displacement of takeaways to areas immediately beyond management zones, and impacts on chain fast-food outlets. We used uncontrolled interrupted time series analyses to estimate changes from up to six years pre- and post-adoption of takeaway management zones around schools. We evaluated three outcomes: mean number of new takeaways within management zones (and by three identified sub-types: full management, town centre exempt and time management zones); mean number on the periphery of management zones (i.e. within an additional 100 m of the edge of zones); and presence of new chain fast-food outlets within management zones. For 26 LAs, we observed an overall decrease in the number of new takeaways opening within management zones. Six years post-intervention, we observed 0.83 (95% CI -0.30, −1.03) fewer new outlets opening per LA than would have been expected in absence of the intervention, equivalent to an 81.0% (95% CI -29.1, −100) reduction in the number of new outlets. Cumulatively, 12 (54%) fewer new takeaways opened than would have been expected over the six-year post-intervention period. When stratified by policy type, effects were most prominent for full management zones and town centre exempt zones. Estimates of intervention effects on numbers of new takeaways on the periphery of management zones, and on the presence of new chain fast-food outlets within management zones, did not meet statistical significance. Our findings suggest that management zone policies were able to demonstrably curb the proliferation of new takeaways. Modelling studies are required to measure the possible population health impacts associated with this change.

Type: Article
Title: Changes in the number of new takeaway food outlets associated with adoption of management zones around schools: A natural experimental evaluation in England
Open access status: An open access version is available from UCL Discovery
DOI: 10.1016/j.ssmph.2024.101646
Publisher version: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmph.2024.101646
Language: English
Additional information: Copyright © 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
Keywords: Takeaway management zones; Exclusion zones; Schools; Takeaways; Urban planning; Natural experiment; Interrupted time series
UCL classification: UCL
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > UCL GOS Institute of Child Health
UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Life and Medical Sciences > Faculty of Population Health Sciences > UCL GOS Institute of Child Health > Population, Policy and Practice Dept
URI: https://discovery-pp.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10190715
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