A British couple reportedly had their son taken from them by social services because they wouldn't follow doctors orders to feed the boy junk food.

The Daily Mail reports that Paul and Lisa Hessey took their 2-year-old son Zak to see a pediatrician because he wasn't eating much and weighed just 17 pounds at 20 months old.

 Doctors suggested Zak stay in the hospital for a two-week assessment of his eating habits, which the Hesseys agreed to.

But when they tried to take Zak home after two weeks, the Hesseys were told by a social worker that Zak needed to be placed into foster care to assess how he eats. The Hesseys claim they were told that if they challenged the decision, social services would "go straight to court and have all your parental rights taken away."

"They kept saying, 'If you love Zak and you want the best for him, then you'll agree to this voluntarily.' They said we had been negative about eating. That was because they had been telling us we should feed Zak crisps, chocolate and cakes to get calories into him." The Hesseys believe in the long-term benefits of healthy eating and rejected medical advice to feed Zak a diet of junk food.

Zak was placed into foster care and the Hesseys weren't allowed to see him for the first six days until they were able to negotiate spending three hours a day with him during the week in the company of a social worker. They went to court to try to get Zak back, and after four months, Zak was returned home. He gained less than a pound in the four months and social services eventually said they were good and caring parents.

In 2007 British social workers decided to allow an 8-year-old boy who weighed almost 200 pounds to remain at home with his mother, who had fed him a steady diet of junk food. A recent study in Britain found that children whose mothers work are less likely to lead healthy lives than those with "stay-at-home" mothers.