The Children’s Commissioner has called for an urgent end to advertising on social media to children after finding they are being “routinely bombarded” with products that claim to change their bodies and appearance.

Dame Rachel de Souza said children were routinely exposed to harmful appearance-changing products online, including weight loss injections, skin lightening products and steroids.

More than three quarters of children (78%) said the ads negatively impacted their self-esteem, with 41% of 13 to 17-year-olds seeing prescription-only weight loss drugs despite a ban on them being advertised to the public.

Dame Rachel’s report, A healthy influence? Children’s exposure to appearance-changing products online, found more than half of children (54%) had seen exercise and diet plans and 52% had seen ads for food and drink products claiming to aid weight loss.

Some 46% of black children and 35% of Asian children has seen ads for skin lightening products, significantly higher than the 24% of white children who reported seeing them and despite many of these products being illegal to sell in the UK and containing toxic ingredients.

Two thirds of children (66%) had seen teeth whitening products online and more than half of girls (56%) had seen cosmetic procedures such as fillers or Botox, despite these being illegal for under-18s.

Some 8% of children had bought or tried non-prescription pills that claimed to aid weight loss, despite these products often being age-restricted to over-18s, and 21% of children had bought or tried food or drink marketed for weight loss.

Black children were more likely to try these products, as well as exercise and diet plans, than white children, the study found.

Some children reported reactions after buying or trying appearance-changing products online, including infections from eyelash products that contained undisclosed chemicals.

The latest report follows findings from a survey by the commissioner in 2024 that found just 40% of girls and 60% of boys were happy with how they look.

Dame Rachel is calling for an end to all advertising to children on social media by amending the Online Safety Act, changes to Ofcom’s Children’s Code of Practice to explicitly protect children from body stigma content, and stronger regulation and enforcement of online sales of age-restricted products.

Dame Rachel said: “Childhood is a short and precious time, but it is undeniable that children today are facing pressures like never before, with too many children growing up in an online world that takes advantage of their insecurities and tells them they are not good enough as they are.

“Extreme and potentially dangerous appearance changing products are being normalised to children through advertising, influencer culture and online posts, despite many of these products being unsafe, illegal or strictly age-restricted. For their developing and fragile sense of self-esteem, this is immensely damaging.

“Many parts of the online world are not built with children’s best interests at heart. The Government should consider every mechanism available to protect children from harmful content and services, including restricting children’s access to some social media platforms, but a social media ban for under-16s can only be one part of the solution. It is not an immediate guarantee that children will be safer online.

“Any ban must respond to what children think and how they behave online, with a clear plan of how it will be enforced so that it does not drive children to other, darker parts of the internet.

“Urgent action is needed to create an online world that is truly safer by design. We cannot continue to accept an online world that profits from children’s insecurities and constantly tells them they need to change or must be better.”

OnePoll surveyed 2,000 children aged 13 to 17 in December.