If you are wondering why the idea of soda taxes causes so much controversy, try this: research published in the Archives of Internal Medicine estimates that a $1.00 price increase on soda and pizza would reduce daily calorie consumption by nearly 200 per day and would help people lose weight.
Or, as USA Today puts it, an 18% increase in the price of soda would be associated with a weight loss of 5 pounds per year.
Just in time for the Albany conference on soda taxes (see previous post), the Beverage Association has issued a report on the great progress it is making in reducing calories from sodas sold in schools.
In fact, the Beverage Association is doing a terrific job on reducing soft drink consumption. Sales of sodas are down by impressive percentages, but so are sales of all drinks sold in school vending machines, as illustrated by this chart from today’s Wall Street Journal.
Source: Wall Street Journal, 3-8-10
This is good news. The next steps to improve school food? Here are a few of my favorites:
If kids don’t buy drinks from vending machines, the schools don’t need them, right?
Update March 9. Thanks to Coca-Cola for sending a copy of the press release and the final progress report summary.
The research demonstrating the not-so-great effects of sodas just pours in, as it were. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has two new research reports, one on justification for taxation of soft drinks, and the other on the negative effects of soft drinks on kids’ health.
David Ludwig writes in JAMA that artificially sweetened drinks are unlikely to help the situation. They just make people want sweeter foods.
And the New York City Health Department has put its anti-soda campaign online. This is its controversial “drinking fat” campaign designed to make the point that excess calories from sugary soft drinks will put on the pounds. Why controversial? Take a look at the cute guy demonstrating the drinking-fat point on the YouTube video.
What’s your take on this?
Here’s the proposed statute. The relevant section reads:
“Create Sales Tax on Soft Drinks. Imposes an additional 18 percent rate of sales and compensating use taxes on fruit drinks that contain less than seventy percent of natural fruit juice and non-dietetic soft drinks, sodas and beverages. By increasing the price, it will discourage individuals, especially children and teenagers, from excessive consumption of these beverages. Revenues will be directed for health care initiatives.”
And here’s the American Beverage Association’s predictable response: hurts the middle class, nobody wants it, no science or logic behind it. The New York Times refers to what’s happening as a “spirited debate” (I am a participant).
It will be interesting to see how this plays out. For example, the maker of a carbonated juice drink wrote me to complain that her product, which is 50% juice and taxable, contains under 70 calories per 8-ounces in comparison to non-taxed 100% fruit juice at 110 calories/8 ounces. Obesity is about calories, no? Or is it really about the kinds of products people habitually drink?
Governor Paterson says he can raise $404 million in state revenues with a 15% tax on soft drinks (but not diet sodas, juices, milk, or water). I’m curious to know what you think of this idea. Please weigh in.
José Tenorio. School Food Politics in Mexico: The Corporatization of Obesity and Healthy Eating Policies. Routledge, 2023.
I was asked for a blurb for this one:
From first-hand observations and deep research, José Tenorio makes it clear that school food in Mexico is about much more than feeding hungry kids; it’s about how food corporations have taken advantage of social inequalities to replace native food traditions with less healthful but profitable products. School food politics, indeed!
This book may seem specialized, but it is a useful case study in the politics of school food—not confined to the United States, apparently.
Mexico leads the way in efforts to promote healthier diets. It has excellent dietary guidelines. It also has warning labels on food products (see my post on these), soda taxes, a ban on trans fats, and other measures.
Mexico’s schools do not provide meals for kids in schools. They sell foods at canteens.
The country set nutrition standards for foods sold in schools in 2011, but compliance is not great.
Public health and food advocacy groups support laws to ban unhealthy foods and drinks from schools. Despite formidible industry opposition, this may actually happen.
This book provides evidence for why it should.
The Task Force on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health released its comprehensive report yesterday.
The report’s purpose is to inform the upcoming White House Conference on Hunger, Nutrition, and Health. If so, it’s going to leave the White House in a quandary.
The report has lots of useful information, beautifully presented, and does all it should on adddressing hunger.
But as I read it, the report, titled Ambitious, Actionable Recommendations to End Hunger, Advance Nutrition, and Improve Health in the United States,” is not nearly ambitious enough when it comes to nutrition and health.
It makes far too many recommendations—30. That’s always a bad sign (too many to do). .
Really, only 2 recommendations are needed. These should establish or expand federal agriculture, food, and nutrition policies to ensure:
The hunger recommendations do the job: they call for ensuring benefits sufficient to meet households’ basic needs.
But the second? A mess.
Here is the most obvious example [my comments follow] .
Recommendation #9: “Reduce the marketing of foods that do not align with the latest DGA and increase the marketing of foods that align with the latest DGA to children and populations with disproportionate rates of diet-related chronic conditions” [Good! But not through the recommended voluntary methods by industry. That won’t work; it requires legislation]
But here’s Recommendation #25: “Increase the ability of food companies to communicate with consumers about the evidence for healthfulness of certain food products and nutrients.” [Uh oh]
This comes with three action items:
What’s missing from this report?
What happened? One member of the committee explained to me that its membership included everyone from anti-hunger advocates to food industry representatives, and too many vested interests were at stake. Members could not agree on anything that would make a real difference to policy. Anything substantive met strong resistance.
When it comes to public health policy, which this most definitely is, the food industry has no business being at the table.
This was a recommendation of the 2019 Lancet Commission on the Global Syndemic of Obesity, Undernutrition, and Climate Change. Read that report. It explains why including the food industry in policy recommendations that might reduce sales is not a good idea.
If I had been a member of this Task Force, I would have called for a minority report on policies for reducing consumption of sugary drinks and ultra-processed foods. But that, of course, is why I’m no longer appointed to such committees.
Berkeley, California, ever at the cutting edge of public health nutrition policy, is banning junk food from checkout counters and aisles.
The new policy will require retailers larger than 2,500 square feet to stock healthy food at the register and in areas where customers wait in line, instead of items like chips, soda and candy. It forbids food items with 5 grams of added sugars and 200 milligrams of sodium, chewing gum and mints with added sugars, and beverages with added sugars or artificial sweeteners. In Berkeley, the policy will affect stores like Safeway, Monterey Market, Whole Foods and Berkeley Bowl.
As a result of efforts like these—public health campaigns, soda taxes, and other initiatives—heavy consumption of sugary drinks (more than 500 calories/day) is declining.
According to a recent study, the percentage of children who drink more than 500 calories worth of soft drinks a day declined from 11% to 3% from 2003 to 2016, and the percentage of adult heavy consumers declined from 13% to 9%.
This trend is in the right direction.
