Fat tax

elmarko

elmarko

elmarko

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Tax fizzy drinks and ban junk food ads

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-21478314

Fizzy drinks should be heavily taxed and junk food adverts banished until after the watershed, doctors have said, in a call for action over obesity.

The Academy of Medical Royal Colleges, which represents nearly every doctor in the UK, said ballooning waistlines already constituted a "huge crisis".

Its report said current measures were failing and called for unhealthy foods to be treated more like cigarettes.

Industry leaders said the report added little to the debate on obesity.

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Apologies if a thread already exists, I didn't see one.

So, what are peoples thoughts on this?.

Obesity is a massive problem (pardon the pun) but the solution is often going to ignite tension & cause arguments (people are pretty sensitive about food it seems).

Personally, I think food companies should be regulated on sugar/salt/fat content.

If you have a dog/cat & it get's fat, you stop feeding it fatty foods - you don't put the nice food next to the healthy food & expect the dog to make the right choice.

It's also widely ignored that a large segment (pardon this second pun) of the population of the UK are also currently addicted to sugar, this clouds their judgement & causes them to consistently make poor diet choices.

From my own experience of dropping 50lb over the last 12months it seems that I was addicted to sugar (just wasn't aware of it) & cutting out all sugar has not only improved my health/increased my energy but also reduced my cravings for sweet food completely.

Your thoughts/opinions are encouraged!.
 
edscdk said:
Obesity reduces life expentency

we have an issue with too many old people

maybe give away chocolate and sugar for free?
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The problem isnt really that people die early, its the sheer scale of illnesses that come from obesity that is the real financial burden, diabetes being a huge drain.
Theirs the thought also where as with alcohol and cigs you can tax the hell out of them each year, off setting ( to a %) the financial burden cause by their effects, with foods, this cant be done really.
Theirs a real disconnect with peoples relationships/ education with their diet these days.

Just add, theirs also a bit connection between fast food places and sports, in some stupid notion this gives them a "better healthier image" they are allowing them so support youth football groups, advertise at premium times. I love the bit of junk as much as anyone, but the obesity levels are pretty dire.
Theirs also the image of what being obese or fat is, people think its having a huge overhanging belly, its not that at all.
 
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Tax everybody more. Kick them out of expensive accomodation and restrict freedom of choice according to income. This appears to be the solution to everything for some.
 
Food pricing based on customer weight, charge the fatties more, and people with willpower and ability to control what they eat, less.

I propose the same model should be used in the aviation industry for ticket pricing.
 
The price of fizzy drinks, crisps and chocolate has already gone up enough to put me off buying them.

70p for a can of Coke/Sprite/Lilt, etc.
60p for a Mars bar
70p for a packet of Walkers

I realize that prices are different in different shops but this is what I'm looking at.

Come off it.
 
Before doing any thing as insane as taxing fat, can we at least review the scientific studies and do a u-turn on healthy diet policy please. It is this fat is evil that needs to be banned. It's a taste transporter and is healthy. Removing fat, means you have to increase refined carbs to make it taste good. Which brings sugar addiction amongst other issues. Fat like proteins makes us fell full longer, compared to carbs. Fat is also essential for absorbing vitamins in the body amongst many other essential processes. We now eat far less fats and yet are health has got much worse.




Government would **** this up, not all fat is the same, not all products are the same.
It'll be yet another blanket rule which will do more harm than good.
 
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wingman said:
Where were you going with this?
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That the problem needs to be addressed at source, not by some fantasy that you can suddenly make obese people start eating cabbages & running 20 miles a day (if they were that way inclined they would not be fat).

Ignoring everything else, the average sugar content in many foods has slowly been creeping up over the last 30 years - this will have an impact on the average waistline.

Personally I don't think taxing is the best method of achieving this goal (as it just punishes everybody including those who have better self-control, it also punishes based on wealth) - strong regulation on sugar content would be better.

Certainly agree with the comments above that it needs scientific evidence behind it, not all fats are equal & sugar is worse than fat for most people.
 
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elmarko1234 said:
If you have a dog/cat & it get's fat, you stop feeding it fatty foods - you don't put the nice food next to the healthy food & expect the dog to make the right choice.
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because the general public are no better than mindless dogs that must be forced to live their life the way you see fit???
 
Healthy food is generally more expensive. You'd find a lot of people eat badly because of budget rather than because they enjoy eating garbage.
 
Tax tax tax, that's all they can come up with.

Whilst taxing, lets also cut on education so we can't educate people to making better choices - where it's been proven that educating when they're young will help enable them make better decisions, including food. No home economics in school IMO is a lose lose situation.

The youth of yesterday lacked the knowledge to food choices and how to cook or eat healthily makes their kids of tomorrow worst as they'll have poorer diets of ready meals, high sugar and fat from food of convenience.

Taxing on food just makes the poor, poorer.
 
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