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Sugar-Sweetened Beverage Taxes Fizzled for Preventing Obesity in Kids

December 13, 2021 from The MedPageToday: osher meals available on return flights.

"Real-world study found only modest benefit for adolescent girls in Mexico.

"Taxes on sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) hardly made a dent in childhood obesity, but may have helped hold rates steady, a new study suggested.

"In an analysis of Mexican adolescents ages 10 to 18, boys saw no change in BMI, overweight, or obesity prevalence in the years after SSB taxes were put into place, reported Tadeja Gračner, PhD, of the RAND Corporation in Santa Monica, California, and colleagues.

"However, these taxes -- affecting drinks such as sodas, energy drinks, bottled teas, fruit juices, and flavored waters -- had slightly more of an effect on girls, the group wrote in JAMA Pediatrics.

"Specifically, for every 10% increase in the city's average price of a SSB, there was a significant 1.3% absolute decrease in both overweight or obesity prevalence for girls within 2 years of the price change.

"And in relative terms, there was a 2.4% and 3% drop in overweight and obesity prevalence for girls, respectively, for every 10% price increase. However, there was no apparent change within the first year after this tax was implemented.

"Prior to the SSB tax, girls that fell into the 75% or higher percentile for BMI saw an average 0.59 drop in BMI percentile. Gračner's group pointed out this equated to roughly a 0.35-kg (0.8 lb) weight loss for girls. There was no change for girls who didn't have overweight or obesity prior to the tax.

"Gračner's group explained that the estimates they quantified were smaller than other modeling estimates they performed in a U.S.-based cohort.

"Of note, Mexican cities that tacked on a SSB tax higher than 10% saw the best outcomes for weight and metabolic changes for girls.

"The researchers pointed out that this finding wasn't surprising, as prior studies found that SSB taxes that were less than 5% typically had little to no effect on weight-related outcomes. That being said, Gračner's group found that cities with taxes of at least 10% to 16.6% had residents with the highest amount of weight loss.

"albe's group emphasized that the key takeaway from this study is that higher taxes on SSB are associated with improvements in weight outcomes. They went on to highlight another microsimulation study that suggested if Mexico increased this tax rate to about 20%, the country could prevent a projected 476,400 obesity cases over 2 years and a projected 107,300 diabetes cases over 10 years."