When was the last time you drank soda, juice, or other forms of sugary drinks? For most Americans, it is a normal part of everyday life. The problem? These drinks are incredibly unhealthy, more so than some companies would lead consumers to believe, according to Xavier Morales, executive director of The Praxis Project, and Jim Krieger, executive director of Healthy Food America. Check out this discussion on the Salud Talks Podcast, Episode 19, "Peddling Poison"! WHAT: A #SaludTalks discussion about sugary drinks and their harmful impacts on consumers
GUESTS: Xavier Morales, executive director of The Praxis Project, and Jim Krieger, executive director of Healthy Food America
WHERE: Available wherever fine podcasts are downloaded, including Apple Podcasts, ...
What we choose to eat affects everything. However, our current food system is unhealthy and unsustainable, leaving us with options that pollute our air and water, consume large amounts of energy, and contribute to chronic disease and premature death, all while leaving millions undernourished. Transitioning away from an animal-based system to a plant-based system, for example, has numerous social, environmental, economic, and individual health benefits. Let’s use #SaludTues on January 28, 2020, to tweet about how you can raise awareness about and push for policies to support healthy food systems. WHAT: #SaludTues Tweetchat: “Elevating Plant-Based Food Systems”
TIME/DATE: 1-2 p.m. ET Tuesday, Jan. 28, 2020
WHERE: On Twitter with hashtag #SaludTues
HOST: ...
Sugary drink taxes are taking out the fizz across the nation. From Washington, D.C., to Berkeley, Calif., sugary drink taxes are raising the price of soda, tea, and energy drinks, with the hope that people will buy fewer taxed drinks. These drinks do not contribute to good health, according to a Salud America! research review. But are shoppers really buying fewer sugary drinks as a result? A series of studies explores this question.
How Sugary Drink Taxes Affect Purchases
A new study from Mathematica Policy Research and others indicates that sugary drink taxes can reduce purchases of sugary drinks. Researchers examined the impact of taxes in four cities: Philadelphia, San Francisco, Seattle, and Oakland. They compared changes in household monthly purchases to nearby cities ...
Earlier this year, the EPA under Andrew Wheeler announced plans to address widespread lead corruption in U.S. public water supplies. In October, the agency released proposed revisions to the Safe Drinking Water Act's "Lead and Copper Rule." These modifications aim to decrease the pervasiveness of the toxin through a series of regulations — including limits on allowed levels of lead in water. Environmentalist groups—including Clean Water Action—are calling for further action. Mainly, they urge for a full replacement of lead services lines throughout the country. If these lines are left intact, they pose a serious concern to Latinos and Americans across the country who face dangerous lead exposure through their drinking water. "Everything else is small potatoes," Erik ...
Sugary drink taxes are bubbling up across the nation. From Philadelphia to Berkeley, Calif., these sugary drink taxes are having an intended benefit—reducing consumption of bad-for-health sugary drinks and driving up water sales. But where is the tax money going? Let's look at Washington, D.C. (11.3% Latino), which recently added a sugary drink tax and is already considering a stronger one, and whether the revenue is benefiting health.
New Sugary Drink Sales Tax in D.C.
D.C. leaders recently bumped up the local sales tax from 6% to 8% on drinks with natural or artificial sweeteners that contain less than 100% juice or at least 50% milk bought in stores. City council member Mary Cheh pushed for the tax. She moved to insert this tax in the city’s $15.5 billion 2020 ...
Amid an obesity crisis and a coronavirus pandemic, Latinos and all people need more water, and less sugar. Do you agree? Speak up! Submit a model comment below to urge the 2020-2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans to add water to the MyPlate/MiPlato graphic, reduce the amount of added sugars, and make healthier diets equitable for all people! Update 6/11/20: Over 55,000 people submitted comments!
Submit a Comment for Dietary Equity!
Nearly two of every three people in the United States live with at least one chronic disease like obesity and heart disease, according to the CDC. These are caused in part by poor diets. Unhealthy eating is now the top cause of premature death in the nation (https://salud.to/unhealthy-eating-death). Communities of color and low-income families ...
In October 2019, Philadelphia Mayor Jim Kenney signed a new law that requires restaurants to make healthy drinks the default drink in kid's meals, over sugary sodas. Kid's meals now will offer a choice of water, nonfat/low-fat milk, or 100% juice. Sugary drinks are not banned. Instead, customers must specifically request them. “Ensuring that these healthy beverage options are available to families is a step in the right direction toward the health and well-being of our city’s children,” said City Council Member Blondell Reynolds Brown, who introduced the law, in a statement.
Why Does Philadelphia Need Healthier Kid's Meals?
About 66% of American children drink at least one sugary beverage a day. Sugary drink consumption contributes to obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular ...
Nearly 2 of 3 U.S. children's drinks sold in 2018 were unhealthy fruit drinks and flavored waters with added sugars and/or diet sweeteners, according to Children’s Drink FACTS 2019, a new report from the Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity. In fact, none of the 34 top-selling children's sugary drinks met expert recommendations for healthy drinks for children. These unhealthy drink sales complicate health equity for Latino and black children, who are targeted more with sugary drink marketing and have higher rates of sugary drink consumption. They face obesity, higher rates of cavities (57% of all Latino kids have cavities), and other health conditions as a result. "Beverage companies have said they want to be part of the solution to childhood obesity, but they continue to ...
How bad is sugary soda for your kid? In New York City (29% Latino), an 8-year-old would need to walk 70 minutes from City Hall to Times Square to burn off the 9 teaspoons of sugar in a kid's meal soda. That's why city leaders are making water, milk, and 100% juice the “default beverages” on kid’s menus, thanks to a new law to reduce childhood obesity in an area where 1 in 4 toddlers and preschoolers have at least one sugary drink a day. New York's City's law goes into effect May 1, 2020. “Sugary beverages contain no nutrients that children need, and they are disproportionally marketed to children in low income neighborhoods and communities of color,” said Dr. Judith A. Salerno of the New York Academy of Medicine, in a statement. “We believe that every child should ...