Health experts have called for an advertising ban on junk food and soft drinks at major sporting events such as the World Cup.
The “sportswashing” of unhealthy products such as soft drinks, crisps and fast food at major sporting events is amplified by digital media, new research suggests.
Experts highlighted concerns about the promotion of unhealthy products during the World Cup and the previous Olympic Games, despite the known link between sweetened drinks and rising rates of noncommunicable diseases.
Research presented at the International Congress on Obesity in Mexico by the World Obesity Federation suggests global advertising campaigns could be contributing to rising rates of Type 2 diabetes, obesity and heart disease.
Coca-Cola has a long history of sponsoring sports, but the authors say adverts have become more prominent and pervasive with huge digital marketing campaigns across social media in the run-up to events.
“That dynamic is playing out right now at the World Cup,” said Dr Melina Magsumbol, an associate director of research at Vital Strategies, who analysed Coca-Cola’s digital marketing during the 2025 Fifa Club World Cup.
“With six billion fans expected to engage with the tournament, Coca-Cola is appealing to young people directly through social media, and has built its official 2026 World Cup campaign around fan emotion as its central theme, backed by a celebrity-studded anthem and months of planned activations.”
Social media reach
Researchers assessed how Coca-Cola’s sponsorship of the 2025 Club World Cup was amplified across social media.
They systematically tracked publicly available social media posts in Brazil, Mexico and the US linking Coca-Cola to the Club World Cup across 358 accounts on X, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and TikTok between June 1 and July 31, 2025.
Most of the 795 posts assessed (71 per cent) featured branding embedded in match footage and interviews rather than direct product promotion. Those posts generated 3.6 billion impressions, the majority of which (79 per cent) were generated by sports broadcasters and streaming platforms.
“Big soda companies should not sponsor major sporting events or have sponsorship deals with sporting organisations like Fifa because of their significant contribution to health and environmental harms,” said Dr Magsumbol.
“Our recommendation is for marketing restrictions to be applied to transnational and digital sports ecosystems, which would ban sports sponsorship by sweetened beverage and other unhealthy product industries.”
The study’s lead author, Dr Nalin Singh Negi, also an associate director of research at global public health organisation Vital Strategies, said brands linked to major sporting events perpetuated a false sense of health and legitimacy.
“That directly contradicts what sport represents, a marketing practice known as sportswashing,” Dr Negi said.
Fifa’s top-tier sponsors, which include Coca-Cola as the tournament’s official drinks partner, are embedded across all World Cup activities and events as part of a global rights agreement.
PepsiCo-owned Lay's, which manufactures crisps with packaging carrying images of famous players such as Lionel Messi and David Beckham, was a regional sponsor at the Qatar World Cup in 2022 and now, four years later, in the US.
McDonald’s is a tier-two sponsor for the World Cup with advertising rights tied to the tournament in the US, Canada and Mexico.
Coca-Cola, Pepsi-Co and McDonald’s were approached for comment.
Lucrative association
A complex, multi-layered sponsorship system aims to maximise advertising revenue and related spending during the biggest sporting event in the world.
Doctors who supported a total ban on soft drink and fast food advertising said sports stars should take a stand against product placement of unhealthy foods.
During the Euro 2020 tournament, Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo placed a significant dent in Coca-Cola's market value by replacing two bottles of the drink with water during a press conference.
The impact on consumer trends caused by the world’s biggest star at the time, who had a social media following of around 500 million, was said to have cost the company $4 billion.
Dr Ravi Arora, an internal medicine consultant at NMC Specialty Hospital in Abu Dhabi, said young people were particularly vulnerable to aggressive marketing.
“They are definitely influenced by hoardings and huge, repetitive adverts,” he said. “Advertorial potential is not just once in a game, it's repetitive and the hydration breaks contribute to that.
“We need to definitely dissuade this kind of advertising, and that goes for any kind of fast food which is known to be unhealthy and contribute to obesity.”
Dr Arora said banning tobacco advertising from Formula One and cricket was an example of how advertisers should fall into line.
“Sporting personalities can make an impression and really make it count with the right messaging,” he said. “The problem is that somehow the impression going across to young people is that these kind of foods make the players perform better, when we know that it is actually quite harmful.”
The international Kick Big Soda Out campaign challenges the sponsorships of teams, athletes and sporting events worldwide. Its goal is to spark change, from global sporting events to local communities.
Experts said sponsorship of major sporting events gives junk food a “health halo effect” – making consumers believe these products are more acceptable and less harmful.
Jamie Richards, chief well-being officer at Valeo Health, said ultra-processed foods and drinks should be banned in professional sport.
“The messaging is deliberate and deliberately misleading,” he said. “I have direct experience, behind the scenes where professional teams are sponsored by these very same companies.
“Not a single member of the team would consider using the product themselves, yet happily pose for photos with branded products, creating the illusion that the product is, at least in part, attributable to their success.”
In Europe, the sports sponsorship market has increased by 15 per cent since 2019 and is valued at around $27 billion as of 2024.
“We have the spectacle of so-called sports drinks littering pitches and apparently being used by athletes when those very drinks aren’t certified as safe by the official body responsible for protecting athletes from inadvertent doping,” said Mr Richards.
“The unfortunate truth is that this is a money game and very few, if any, well-meaning investors can afford to buy into it.”
