Friday 19 February 2016

Sugar Tax & UK Obesity

This morning the media are awash with PR from a UK Cancer Charity launching a study prepared by a coalition of charities that claims obesity can be reduced by 5% of the UK population by 2025.

I delved into the technical summary as I have an interest in these extrapolations. The claim is that a 20% excise tax levied on sweetened soft drinks could avoid 3.7 million people (about 5%) becoming obese (>=30 BMI) by 2025 and that without the tax obesity will rise from 29% in 2015 to 34% in 2025.