��Ī - sugar

UK ‘sugar tax’ linked to fall in child hospital admissions for tooth extraction

Anonymous — Wed, 15 Nov 2023 00:00:45 +0000

In a study published today in BMJ Nutrition, Prevention & Health, researchers at the Medical Research Council (MRC) Epidemiology Unit at ��Ī found that the levy may have reduced the number of under-18s having a tooth removed due to tooth decay by 12%. The largest reductions were in children aged up to nine years old.

Sugar-sweetened drinks account for around 30% of the added sugars in the diets of children aged one to three years and over a half by late adolescence. In England, nearly 90% of all tooth extractions in young children are due to decay, resulting in around 60,000 missed school days a year.

The World Health Organization has recommended a tax on sugar-sweetened drinks to reduce sugar consumption, which more than 50 countries have implemented. In March 2016, the UK Government announced a soft drinks industry levy or ‘sugar tax’, which aimed to reduce sugar intake by encouraging drinks manufacturers to reformulate their products. The levy was implemented in April 2018.

While the relationship between sugar-sweetened drinks and tooth decay is well established, no studies have used real-world data to examine the relationship between the levy and dental health.

To address this, the researchers analysed hospital admissions data for tooth extractions due to tooth decay in children up to 18 years old in England from January 2014 to February 2020. They studied trends overall as well as broken down by neighbourhood deprivation and age groups.

Overall, in children aged 18 and under, there was an absolute reduction in hospital admissions of 3.7 per 100,000 population per month compared to if the soft drinks levy had not happened. This equated to a relative reduction of 12% compared to if the levy had not been introduced.

Based on a population of nearly 13 million children in England in 2020, the researchers estimated that the reduction avoided 5,638 admissions for tooth decay. Reductions in hospital admissions were greatest in younger children aged up to four years and among children aged five to nine years, with absolute reductions of 6.5 and 3.3 per 100,000 respectively.

Dr Nina Rogers from the MRC Epidemiology Unit at the ��Ī, the study’s first author, said: “This is an important finding given that children aged five to nine are the most likely to be admitted to hospital for tooth extractions under general anaesthesia.”

No significant changes in admission rates for tooth decay were seen in older age groups of 10–14 years and 15–18 years. However, reductions in hospital admissions were seen in children living in most areas regardless of deprivation.

As this is an observational study and because there was no comparable control group, the researchers cannot say definitively that the soft drinks levy caused this reduction in tooth decay. They acknowledge that other national interventions such as the sugar reduction programme and compulsory nutrition labels alongside the levy may have raised public awareness of sugar consumption and influenced buying habits.

Nevertheless, they conclude that their study “provides evidence of possible benefits to children’s health from the UK soft drinks industry levy beyond obesity which it was initially developed to address.”

Professor David Conway, co-author, and professor of dental public health at University of Glasgow added: “Tooth extractions under general anaesthesia is among the most common reason for children to be admitted to hospital across the UK. This study shows that ambitious public health policies such as a tax on sugary drinks can impact on improving child oral health.”

The research was funded by the Medical Research Council and the National Institute for Health and Care Research.

Reference
Rogers, N T et al. Estimated impact of the UK soft drinks industry levy on childhood hospital admissions for carious tooth extractions: interrupted time series analysis. BMJ Nutrition Prevention & Health; 14 Nov 2023; DOI:10.1136/bmjnph-2023-000714

Adapted from a press release from the BMJ.

The UK soft drinks industry levy introduced in 2018 may have saved more than 5,500 hospital admissions for tooth extractions, according to an analysis by researchers at the ��Ī.

This is an important finding given that children aged five to nine are the most likely to be admitted to hospital for tooth extractions under general anaesthesia

Nina Rogers

Michal Jarmoluk (Pixabay)

Child receiving dental treatment

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Sugary drinks tax may have prevented over 5,000 cases of obesity a year in year six girls alone

cjb250 — Thu, 26 Jan 2023 19:00:11 +0000

The study, published today in PLOS Medicine, looked at the impact of the levy on reception age children and those in year six, but found no significant association between the levy and obesity levels in year six boys or younger children from reception class.

The research was supported by the National Institute of Health and Care Research (NIHR) and the Medical Research Council.

Obesity has become a global public health problem. In England, one in ten reception age children (four to five years old) is living with obesity and this figure doubles to one in five children in year six (10 to 11 years). Children who are obese are more likely to suffer from serious health problems including high blood pressure, type II diabetes and depression in childhood and in later life.

In the UK, young people consume significantly more added sugars than is recommended – by late adolescence, they typically consume 70g of added sugar per day, more than double the recommended amount (30g). A large source of this is sugar-sweetened drinks. Children from deprived households are more likely to be at risk of obesity and to be heavy consumers of sugar-sweetened drinks.

In April 2018, to protect children from excessive sugar consumption and tackle childhood obesity, the UK governments introduced a two-tier sugar tax on soft drinks – the soft drinks industry levy. The tax was targeted at manufacturers of the drinks to incentivise them to reduce the sugar content of soft drinks.

Researchers from the Medical Research Council (MRC) Epidemiology Unit at the ��Ī tracked changes in the levels of obesity in children in England in reception year and year six between 2014 and 2020. Taking account of previous trends in obesity levels, they compared changes in levels of obesity 19 months after the sugar tax came into effect.

The team found that the introduction of the sugar tax was associated with an 8% relative reduction* in obesity levels in year six girls, equivalent to preventing 5,234 cases of obesity per year in this group alone. Reductions were greatest in girls whose schools were in deprived areas, where children are known to consume the largest amount of sugary drinks – those living in the most deprived areas saw a 9% reduction.

However, the team found no associations between the sugar tax coming into effect and changes in obesity levels in children from reception class. In year 6 boys, there was no overall change in obesity prevalence.

Dr Nina Rogers from the MRC Epidemiology Unit at ��Ī, the study’s first author, said: “We urgently need to find ways to tackle the increasing numbers of children living with obesity, otherwise we risk our children growing up to face significant health problems. That was one reason why the UK’s soft drinks industry levy was introduced, and the evidence so far is promising. We’ve shown for the first time that it is likely to have helped prevent thousands of children each year becoming obese.

“It isn’t a straightforward picture, though, as it was mainly older girls who benefited. But the fact that we saw the biggest difference among girls from areas of high deprivation is important and is a step towards reducing the health inequalities they face.”

Although the researchers found an association rather than a causal link, this study adds to previous findings that the levy was associated with a substantial reduction in the amount of sugar in soft drinks.

Senior author Professor Jean Adams from the MRC Epidemiology Unit said: “We know that consuming too many sugary drinks contributes to obesity and that the UK soft drinks levy led to a drop in the amount of sugar in soft drinks available in the UK, so it makes sense that we also see a drop in cases of obesity, although we only found this in girls. Children from more deprived backgrounds tend to consume the largest amount of sugary drinks, and it was among girls in this group that we saw the biggest change.”

There are several reasons why the sugar tax did not lead to changes in levels of obesity among the younger children, they say. Very young children consume fewer sugar-sweetened drinks than older children, so the soft drinks levy would have had a smaller effect. Similarly, fruit juices are not included in the levy, but contribute similar amounts of sugar in young children’s diets as sugar-sweetened beverages.

It’s unclear why the sugar tax might affect obesity prevalence in girls and boys differently, however, especially since boys are higher consumers of sugar-sweetened beverages. One explanation the researchers put forward is the possible impact of advertising – numerous studies have found that boys are often exposed to more food advertising content than girls, both through higher levels of TV viewing and in how adverts are framed. Physical activity is often used to promote junk food and boys, compared to girls, have been shown to be more likely to believe that energy dense junk foods depicted in adverts will boost physical performance and so are more likely to choose energy-dense, nutrient-poor products following celebrity endorsements.

The study was a collaboration involving researchers from the ��Ī, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, University of Oxford, Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health and University of Bath.

*A relative reduction is the difference between the expected incidence of obesity had the sugar tax not been introduced and the actual incidence.

Reference
Rogers, NT et al. Associations between trajectories of obesity prevalence in English primary school children and the UK soft drink industry levy: an interrupted time series analysis of surveillance data. PLOS Med; 26 Jan 2023; DOI: 10.1371/journal.pmed.1004160

The introduction of the soft drinks industry levy – the ‘sugary drinks tax’ – in England was followed by a drop in the number of cases of obesity among older primary school children, according to ��Ī researchers. Taking into account current trends in obesity, their estimates suggest that around 5,000 cases of obesity per year may have been prevented in year six girls alone.

We urgently need to find ways to tackle the increasing numbers of children living with obesity, otherwise we risk our children growing up to face significant health problems. That was one reason why the UK’s soft drinks industry levy was introduced, and the evidence so far is promising

Nina Rogers

ti-ja (Getty Images)

Child's hands pouring a drink into a glass

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Sugar purchased in soft drinks fell 10% following introduction of industry levy

cjb250 — Wed, 10 Mar 2021 23:30:06 +0000

Following publication of this study, subsequent analysis by the research team identified that the analysis presented in the original paper contained an error. The authors alerted the BMJ, who have now retracted the original paper and published a corrected version in BMJOpen.

Overall, the estimate of change in purchasing of sugar from all soft drinks combined at one year post implementation of the levy reduces from a 30g (or 10%) fall per household per week to an 8g (or 3%) fall per household per week. Alongside, the estimate of change in volume of soft drinks purchases increases from no change to a 189g (or 3%) increase per household per week.

The authors believe that the results still have important public health implications and indicate that the UK Soft Drinks Industry Levy may have had a public health benefit (by reducing household purchasing of sugar from soft drinks) without harming, and indeed potentially benefiting, industry (by increasing total volume of soft drinks purchased).

For further details, visit: https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n254

While the volume of soft drinks purchased did not change, the amount of sugar in those drinks was 30g lower per household per week, which the researchers say represents a ‘win-win’ for public health and industry.

Sugary drinks have been linked to a number of health issues, including dental caries, obesity, type 2 diabetes and heart disease. In April 2018, the UK introduced a Soft Drinks Industry Levy explicitly designed to incentivise manufacturers to reduce the sugar content of soft drinks. The levy was placed on manufacturers, importers and bottlers rather than on consumers. It included two levy tiers: 24p per litre for ‘high tier’ drinks containing more than or equal to 8g total sugar per 100ml; and 18p per litre for ‘low tier’ drinks containing more than or equal to 5g and less than 8g total sugar per 100ml.

A team led by researchers from ��Ī’s Centre for Diet and Activity Research (CEDAR) at the MRC Epidemiology Unit analysed data from the Kantar Worldpanel, in which participating households are asked to record all food and drink purchases brought into the home. This included approximately 31 million purchases of drinks, confectionery and toiletries from March 2014 to March 2019.

The team divided soft drinks into three categories based on sugar content: high tier drinks, low tier drinks and no levy drinks (those with less than 5g total sugar per 100ml). As the Soft Drinks Industry Levy may have led households to substitute other drinks, they also examined purchasing of drinks exempt from the levy, including milk-based drinks, alcoholic drinks and no-added-sugar fruit juices.

The researchers compared purchases in March 2019 against a ‘counterfactual’ estimate – that is, an estimate based on pre-existing trends of how the purchases would look had the levy not taken place at all. This is the first analysis of the impact of the UK Soft Drinks Industry Levy on drink purchases that takes pre-existing trends into account. The results of the study, funded by the NIHR, are published today in The BMJ.

Prior to the introduction of the levy, the volume of high-tier drinks and amount of sugar associated was on a downward trend. However, even taking this trend into consideration, by March 2019, the volume of high tier drinks purchased had fallen by 155ml (44%) per household per week compared to the counterfactual estimate. The amount of sugar purchased in these drinks reduced by 18.0g per household per week, a 46% decrease.

For low tier drinks, the volume of drinks purchased was 177ml (86%) lower per household per week in March 2019 compared with the counterfactual estimate. The amount of sugar fell by 12.5g (an 86% decrease).

Although the volume of no levy drinks purchased didn’t change, as these soft drinks are not sugar-free and some increased in their sugar content, this meant that the sugar purchased from these drinks increased by 15.3g, equivalent to a 166% increase.

Overall, compared to the counterfactual estimate, there was no change in the volume of all soft drinks purchased in March 2019. However, there was a reduction in sugar purchased in all soft drinks (including exempt drinks) combined of 29.5g per household per week, equivalent to a 10% decrease.

The introduction of the Soft Drinks Industry Levy also coincided with significant decreases in purchasing of bottled water. However, the team say this reduction may be due to increases in concern about single-use plastic, which have been attributed, in the UK, to the broadcast of the BBC’s nature documentary series Blue Planet 2.

Dr David Pell from CEDAR, the study’s first author, said: “A 10% drop in the amount of sugar purchased from soft drinks might sound modest, but we know there’s an association between the amount of sugar drinks we consume and the risk of developing conditions such as obesity, type 2 diabetes and high blood pressure. Cutting out even a relatively small amount of sugar should have important impacts on the number of people with obesity and diabetes.”

Professor Martin White, also from the CEDAR, and the project lead, added: “The Soft Drinks Industry Levy appears to have led to a reduction in the amount of sugar that people are purchasing in soft drinks without impacting on the overall volume of soft drinks sold. It’s likely that this is due to manufacturers reformulating their products and reducing the sugar concentration in their drinks, as well as to consumers switching to lower sugar alternatives.

“This represents a valuable win-win for public health and the food industry – potentially improving people’s health with no detrimental effect on the volume of soft drinks that companies are selling.”

The research was funded by the National Institute for Health Research and the Medical Research Council. The Centre for Diet and Activity Research is funded by the British Heart Foundation, Cancer Research UK, the Economic and Social Research Council, the Medical Research Council, the National Institute for Health Research, and Wellcome.

Reference
Pell, D et al. Changes in British household purchases of soft drinks associated with implementation of the Soft Drinks Industry Levy: a controlled interrupted time series analysis. BMJ; 11 Mar 2021; DOI: 10.1136/bmj.n254

The amount of sugar purchased by households through soft drinks fell by 10% in the year following the introduction of the UK Soft Drinks Industry Levy, say researchers at the ��Ī. [RETRACTED]

marsjo

Bottles of soft drink

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Contracts give Coca-Cola power to ‘quash’ health research, study suggests

fpjl2 — Tue, 07 May 2019 23:35:29 +0000

A study of over 87,000 documents obtained through Freedom of Information requests has revealed a contract mechanism that could allow Coca-Cola to “quash” findings from some of the health research it funds at public universities in the US and Canada.

The study, published today in the Journal of Public Health Policy, identified several clauses in legal documents that give the company early sight of any findings, combined with the right to “terminate without reason” and walk away with the data and intellectual property.

Taken together, these clauses could suppress “critical health information”, and indeed may have done so already, according to the study’s authors. Much of the research Coca-Cola supports is in the fields of nutrition, physical inactivity and energy balance.

The authors argue that the clauses contravene Coca-Cola’s commitments to transparent and “unrestricted” support for science, which came after criticism of the opaque way some major food corporations fund health research.

Researchers from the ��Ī, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, University of Bocconi, and US Right to Know, call on corporate funders to publish lists of terminated studies. They say scientists should publish agreements with industry to reassure the public that findings are free from influence.

“It is certainly true that the contracts we have found allow for unfavourable developments or findings to be quashed prior to publication,” said lead author Dr Sarah Steele, a policy researcher from ��Ī’s Department of Politics and International Studies.

“Coca-Cola have declared themselves at the forefront of transparency when it comes to food and beverage giants funding health research. In fact, our study suggests that important research might never see the light of day and we would never know about it.

“We are already hearing accusations from experts in nutrition that the food industry is copying tactics from big tobacco’s playbook. Corporate social responsibility has to be more than just shiny websites stating progressive policies that get ignored.”

Consumption of high calorie, low nutrient food and drink is believed to be a major factor in the childhood obesity epidemic. Last year, the UK government introduced a “sugar tax” on many soft drinks, including Coca-Cola’s flagship product.

US Right to Know, a non-profit consumer and public health research group, submitted 129 FOI requests between 2015 and 2018 relating to academics at North American institutions who received Coca-Cola funding.

The research team combed through the vast tranche of resulting documents and discovered five research agreements made with four universities: Louisiana State University, University of South Carolina, University of Toronto and the University of Washington.

The funded work includes “energy flux and balance” studies and research on beverage intake during exercise. Coca-Cola’s own transparency website declares that scientists retain full control over their research and the company has no right to prevent publication of results.

However, while contracts show Coca-Cola does not control day-to-day conduct, the company retains various rights throughout the process. These include the right to receive updates and comment on findings prior to research publication, and the power to terminate studies early without reason.

The documents yielded by the FOI requests contained no firm examples of Coca-Cola suppressing unfavourable research, although the study authors say “what is important is that the provision exists”. All documents relating to the contracts are now accessible on the US Right to Know website.

Emails show one scientist expressing uncertainty over his study termination (“…they have not communicated with us in several months”) and concern over intellectual property.

Another scientist is seen arguing that his contract is “very restrictive for an ‘unrestricted grant’”.

“These contracts suggest that Coke wanted the power to bury research it funded that might detract from its image or profits,” said Gary Ruskin, co-director of US Right to Know.

“With the power to trumpet positive findings and bury negative ones, Coke-funded science seems more like an exercise in public relations.”

The researchers acknowledge that the food and beverage industry may be updating research contracts in line with new public commitments, but without seeing those contracts it is hard to know.

They say their Coca-Cola case study suggests a continued lack of transparency that should be remedied with “hard” information on funding, rather than relying on self-reported conflicts of interest.

“Journals should require authors of funded research to upload the research agreements for studies as appendices to any peer-reviewed publication,” said Steele.

“The lack of robust information on input by industry and on studies terminated before results are published, makes it impossible to know how much of the research entering the public domain reflects industry positions.”

New study of FOI documents uncovers provisions that could allow the beverage giant to suppress findings from health science it funds at North American universities. Researchers argue that Coca-Cola’s contracts run counter to their public declarations of openness.

It is certainly true that the contracts we have found allow for unfavourable developments or findings to be quashed prior to publication

Sarah Steele

Meghan Schiereck

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Opinion: When it comes to sugary drinks, people prefer a nudge than a tax

Anonymous — Thu, 09 Jun 2016 14:26:09 +0000

If sugary drinks were sold in smaller bottles, stores stocked fewer of them, and positioned them less prominently, we would drink fewer of them. But would we find these changes acceptable? The results of our recent study show that most people find these “nudges” (altering cues in the environment to change people’s behaviour) to be acceptable ways to prevent obesity. Taxing sugary drinks, however, was only acceptable to a minority.

But for both nudging and taxing, the acceptability of the intervention increased the more effective participants judged them to be. This suggests that people are prepared to trade off their dislike of an intervention for achieving a goal they value, such as tackling obesity.

As a population, we consume too much energy. Most people in the UK are now obese or overweight. We spend an estimated 10% of the NHS budget on treating the consequences. Excess consumption of sugar, including from sugary drinks, contributes to this.

Sugary drinks are consumed more by the poorest in society explaining, in part, the higher rates of obesity in this group. Unfortunately, educating people about the health harms of consuming an excess of sugary drinks – an intervention that most people find acceptable – does not reduce their consumption.

But the evidence is now growing that “nudges” as well as taxes could reduce consumption of sugary drinks. The recent announcement of a tax on sugary drinks in England comes with much public support, and the case is made more compelling by recent evidence from Mexico that taxing drinks reduces consumption, particularly among the poor. But obesity won’t be cracked by tax alone. Adding nudges to taxes would likely help, but the acceptability of nudging has, until now, been largely unknown.

In New York, a recent attempt to cap the size of sugary drinks sold in restaurants and other food outlets elicited a strong reaction from locals. But these views may have been influenced by campaigns run by industry-funded consumer groups that placed adverts on billboards and in newspapers asserting that this measure undermined individual freedom. Given that introducing these sorts of interventions will probably require regulation, it is important to gauge public acceptability outside of the context of a media campaign in one city.

Change the environment, change the behaviour

For our study, we recruited 1,093 participants from the UK and 1,082 from the US.

We compared the acceptability of three nudge interventions (reducing the size of sugary drinks bottles, elongating the shape of cans of sugary drinks so they look larger than current cans, and altering where on the shelf drinks were placed) with two more traditional interventions: education and taxation.

Education was the most accepted intervention (more than 80% of participants considered it to be acceptable), taxation the least (fewer than 46% judged it acceptable), and the nudge interventions rated between these (range: 51% to 68%).

Highlighting the unconscious nature of nudges did not reduce their acceptability. Nudging is more acceptable than taxation, but the acceptability of both may be sensitive to evidence of their effectiveness.

Perceived effectiveness was the strongest predictor of acceptability for all interventions across both the US and UK groups. In other words, the more effective people perceived an intervention to be, the more acceptable they found it. This replicates findings from other studies.

Mexico provides an interesting case study. With funding from Bloomberg Philanthropies, non-governmental organisations bought prominent advertising space to counter industry opposition to sugary drinks taxes. This included presenting evidence of taxation’s effectiveness at preventing obesity and other consequences of high consumption. This supports the idea that clear communication to the public of an intervention’s effectiveness – in this case, taxing sugary drinks – can increase public acceptability of the intervention. This may then lead politicians to implement the intervention.

Attributing obesity to the environment, rather than willpower, also predicted acceptability. The more people attributed over-consumption to the environment, the greater their support for interventions, particularly the three nudge interventions. This suggests that the public’s judgements of nudging could become even more favourable if we can successfully convey scientific understandings of human behaviour. This would result in people understanding that much of our behaviour, that is shaped by the environment, takes place outside of conscious awareness. Changing the environment could therefore help tackle obesity.

Theresa Marteau, Professor of Behaviour and Health, ��Ī

This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article.

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the individual author(s) and do not represent the views of the ��Ī.

Theresa Marteau (Behaviour and Health Research Unit) discusses how to get people to consume less sugar.

Dan Hughes

mmmm coke

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Regular consumption of sugary drinks associated with type 2 diabetes

cjb250 — Wed, 22 Jul 2015 08:48:09 +0000

An international team of researchers led by the MRC Epidemiology Unit at the ��Ī set out to assess whether or not habitual consumption of sugar sweetened drinks, artificially sweetened drinks, or fruit juice was associated with the incidence of type 2 diabetes – and to estimate the 10-year risk attributable to sugar sweetened drinks in the USA and UK.

The researchers analysed the results of 17 observational studies and found that habitual consumption of sugar sweetened drinks was positively associated with incidence of type 2 diabetes, independently of obesity status.

The association between artificially sweetened drinks or fruit juice and type 2 diabetes was less evident. Yet, the researchers found little evidence for benefits of these beverages, and therefore concluded these drinks are unlikely to be healthy alternatives to sugar sweetened drinks for preventing type 2 diabetes.

The researchers point out that the studies analysed were observational, so no definitive conclusions can be drawn about cause and effect. However, assuming a causal association, they estimate that two million new-onset type 2 diabetes events in the USA and 80,000 in the UK from 2010 to 2020 would be related to consumption of sugar sweetened beverages.

This latest review builds on ongoing research into the health impact of sugar sweetened drinks, including recent findings from the EPIC-InterAct study in eight European countries as well as work in the EPIC-Norfolk study in the UK, which found that drinking water or unsweetened tea or coffee in place of one sugary drink per day can help to reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes.

Dr Fumiaki Imamura, lead author of the study at the MRC Epidemiology Unit, said: “These findings together indicate that substituting sugar sweetened drinks with artificially sweetened drinks or fruit juice is unlikely to be the best strategy in reducing the risk of developing type 2 diabetes: water or other unsweetened beverages are better options.”

Dr Nita Forouhi, senior author of the study at the MRC Epidemiology Unit, said: “Our new findings provide further evidence to support the recent UK Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition (SACN) recommendation that minimising the consumption of sugary drinks presents a clear opportunity towards the goal of free sugars contributing to no more than 5% of daily energy intake and to improve health.”

The study was supported by the Medical Research Council.

Reference
Imamura, F et al. Consumption of sugar sweetened beverages, artificially sweetened beverages, and fruit juice and incidence of type 2 diabetes: systematic review, meta-analysis, and estimation of population attributable fraction. The BMJ 21 July 2015.

Adapted from a press release from The BMJ.

Sugar sweetened drinks may give rise to nearly two million diabetes cases over ten years in the US and 80,000 in the UK, estimates a study published in the BMJ.

Substituting sugar sweetened drinks with artificially sweetened drinks or fruit juice is unlikely to be the best strategy in reducing the risk of developing type 2 diabetes

Fumiaki Imamura

Mike Schmid

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�������������Ī - sugar

UK ‘sugar tax’ linked to fall in child hospital admissions for tooth extraction

Sugary drinks tax may have prevented over 5,000 cases of obesity a year in year six girls alone

Sugar purchased in soft drinks fell 10% following introduction of industry levy

Contracts give Coca-Cola power to ‘quash’ health research, study suggests

Opinion: When it comes to sugary drinks, people prefer a nudge than a tax

Change the environment, change the behaviour

Regular consumption of sugary drinks associated with type 2 diabetes

��Ī - sugar