sugary beverages

Only half of adult Americans and 61 percent of children consume a sugar-sweetened beverage on any given day, down sharply from consumption rates a decade earlier, reports the New York Times, citing a study in the journal Obesity. Fewer people are drinking sugary beverages and when they do, they consume fewer calories.

The Cook County Board, overseeing the 41 percent of Illinoisans who live in Chicago and nearby suburbs, is expected to repeal its 1-cent-per-ounce soda tax during a meeting today, only weeks after it took effect. The change of mind in Cook County, the largest jurisdiction in the nation to tax sugary beverages, is a dramatic defeat for public-health advocates.

Cook County, the most populous county in Illinois, will begin collecting a penny-per-ounce tax on sugary beverages beginning on Wednesday, making it the largest jurisdiction with a soda tax, following a state court decision that the tax is constitutional, said the Chicago Tribune. Som

By nearly a 3-to-2 margin, voters in Santa Fe rejected a tax on sugary beverages in a referendum that attracted millions of dollars in outside spending. The results were a boost for the soft drink industry and may turn attention to Seattle, where Mayor Ed Murray has proposed a 1.75-cent an …

Voters in Santa Fe, New Mexico, decide today whether to adopt a 2-cent-per-ounce tax on sugary beverages — not just on sodas, but on sweetened sports drinks like Gatorade, lemonades and caffeinated energy drinks, among others, says U.S. News & World Report. Artificially sweetened drinks, infant formula, chocolate milk, pure fruit juices, and weight-loss drinks like Ensure would be exempted.

Opponents of Philadelphia's 1.5-cent-an-ounce tax on sugary beverages, who lost last year in Common Pleas court, asked the Commonwealth Court to overturn the levy as a form of double taxation, said the Associated Press. In arguments before a seven-judge panel, attorney Chip Becker said the state already imposes a sales tax on soda so the city is barred by law from taxing it too.

Schools across Britain will see an additional 1 billion pounds ($1.2 billion) for sports from a tax on sugary beverages that will be imposed beginning in April 2018, said Phillip Hammond, chancellor of exchequer, in laying out the proposed government budget. The tax was announced last March as step toward better public health through lower rates of obesity, diabetes and tooth decay, said the Independent.

A type of spyware, supposedly restricted to use by law-enforcement agencies, was found on the smartphones of three prominent proponents of the 10-percent excise tax on soda and other sugary beverages adopted by Mexico in 2014, says the New York Times. The spyware piggybacked its way onto phones with harassing messages to the men, one of whom is director of nutrition policy at Mexico's National Institute of Public Health.

A pair of studies released by the Centers for Disease Control indicate that children and adults consume roughly the same amount of calories from soda and other sugary beverages, such as sports drinks, as they did at the start of the decade, says the Washington Post. "Rates have stalled at well above the recommended limit."

A prominent medical journal published what the New York Times called a "scathing attack on global health advice to eat less sugar," arguing that such recommendations were based on weak evidence. Just as quickly, however, critics of the study pointed out that it was biased.

With few barriers to entry and younger consumers seeking alternatives to sugary drinks, start-ups in everything from juices and coffee to flavored water are flourishing, says the New York Times. The onetime founder of Odwalla, for example, has rebounded with a nut-drink company called Califia Farms that has hit $100 million in sales within four years.

At least 30 medical centers across the nation have restricted the sale of soda and full-calorie energy drinks, a list that includes the Cleveland Clinic, says the New York Times. UC-San Francisco, with a health sciences center, has gone a step farther by stopping sales entirely of sugar-sweetened beverages on its campus and creating the setting to study the impact on people who formerly drank the beverages during the work day.

The grassroots can beat Big Soda, says Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney in an interview about the City Council vote during the summer to put a 1.5-cent-per-ounce tax on soda and sugary beverages. "Don't be afraid of Big Soda. They are not that tough," Kenney told Vox.

Assemblyman Richard Bloom pulled California’s latest soda tax bill before it could come up for a committee vote on Tuesday, reports The Sacramento Bee.