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Councils blew £30 million of taxpayers' money on weight loss programs which resulted in just 220 people losing weight, MPs heard.
Experts have warned that there is no evidence that diets work in the long term and that an obsession with them is fueling the UK's obesity epidemic.
Weight loss goals worsen health by promoting stress and stigma, and focusing on self-esteem and a healthy lifestyle would be more effective, the Commons Health Committee has been told.
Even telling schoolchildren they are too chubby is counterproductive as they pile on more pounds as they get older, the psychologists added.
Councils blew £30 million of taxpayers' money on weight loss programs which resulted in just 220 people losing weight, MPs heard
Around seven in ten adults and four in ten 11-year-olds in England are overweight, increasing their risk of heart disease, cancer and type 2 diabetes.
Ministers have vowed to tackle the nation's bulging waistlines and last year pledged £100 million to fund additional weight management courses.
But figures from the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities suggest the extra money given to councils for weight loss last year did not meet its target.
Helen James, founder of Nutriri, a social enterprise that promotes health rather than weight, told MPs that just £30 million of the fund had been used between April and December last year.
Experts have warned that there is no evidence that diets work in the long term and that an obsession with them is fueling the UK's obesity epidemic
The programs received 15,753 referrals because of the extra money, but a third of people never bothered to enroll and only 1,601 completed the course.
Of these, 220 people lost 5 percent of their body weight, Miss James added, describing the results as "ineffective" and a policy failure. This means the expenditure equates to more than £136,000 per successful weight loss attempt.
Dr. Angela Meadows, a specialist height psychologist at the University of Essex, said: "Diet interventions in trials and randomized controlled trials have terribly poor results... the best thing to do would be to stop intervening."
She also criticized the National Child Measurement Program, which records children's weight at the start and end of primary school. “Things we do to control weight, such as: