Amending the EU Withdrawal Bill: a safeguard for health

Detailed analyses of the health consequences of Brexit have focused on its negative effects on the UK's National Health Service, food security, international cooperation to combat threats to health, medicines regulation, and medical research.1 Faced with this depressing picture, it is natural to seek any glimmer of hope. Could there be any opportunities to improve health? The answer, invariably, is that leaving the European Union (EU) could allow the UK to go beyond existing European policies to strengthen protection in public health—eg, by introducing traffic light labelling on food or implementing stricter environmental standards.