English: Keep Calm and Carry On UK government poster (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
What scientists call “Overweight” changes with our knowledge of human health (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
This article from the BBC is a MUST READ in my view.
BBC News – Sugary drinks tax would have ‘modest’ effect on obesity.
Personally, I was disgusted at the weak position taken by the BBC in this article; it merely cites different self-interest groups and one biased piece of research.
The real context is that obesity is a growing crisis for the UK, with the Government’s response being far too little too late. One wonders if the food and drinks’ companies are behind the UK Government‘s complacency, with their robust lobbying?
Surely, it’s time for the UK Government to take a strategic look at obesity and consider significantly higher taxes, across the board, for the whole food and drink sector where there is a link to obesity?
Any thoughts?
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Dr Alf's Blog 
In the UK there is already tax on sugary foods by the VAT on food, alcohol and even yoghurt and other desserts.
Stealth taxes make up fully 75% of all tax on people, so the poorest people who eat the most rubbish food as it is the cheapest have no choice but pay the greatest percentage in tax on their money.
The lowest in income have always had the poorest diet. Noting changes. The government makes more money from personal taxation from the poor than any other income level in the UK.
So the much crowed over welfare reform is the biggest lie in political history. People pay for their own benefit and state pension from their own taxation, and most of those on state pension continue to work. The state pension is deferred wages from our youth. Most people on benefit have worked in their lives for decades of life. And people pay the 75% of Indirect Taxes in or out of work and however long we live.
Even more tax on people to solve what exactly? The BBC can imprison you for not paying a TV Licence. Now that is obscene.
http://www.theswansnewparty.org.uk
Thank you for sharing your views in your latest posting.
Greater taxation of unhealthy food an drink is an option for government healthcare policy.
What is really required is a strategic approach to government based on evidence-based policy. See latest blog entitled “A strategic approach towards Best-in-Class Government in the UK? John Gelmini”
Dr Alf has unwittingly identified the BBC for what it is, a craven mouthpiece for the interests of a trendy left wing Metropolitan elite, controlled by faceless people in the Bilderberg movement, and the Alimentarius Commission which decides what goes into or food and drink.
There are several obvious causes of obesity that NHS doctors like my own Australian GP is very
keen to tell me about whenever I go to see her:
–Sugar
–Salt
–Fat content in food
–Too much food
–Lack of exercise
The BBC is quick to sack presenters before they become too fat or too old as Miriam O”Reilly the plump Countryfile presenter discovered, yet secretly it, like the Government, is not keen on the idea of people living too long and draining the Pension system dry because that would threaten the licence fee.
It is also hypocritical because it often has programs on dating /relationships in which hapless and gormless aspirant suitors are berated for their appearance, dress-sense, presentation and obesity before being supposedly transformed into svelte, Next dressed clones, appealing enough to whatever person the presenters decide they ought to meet.
Secretly it (the Government)wants people to be healthy and in work for most of their lives and then die before they get too expensive through greater morbidity.
The BBC which supposedly exists just on the licence fee, wants pretty much the same so that it can go on applying a “Poll Tax” on television viewers in order to perpetuate its existence.
This is why it misreports on health, uses product placement of food, clothing, office products, cars and furniture as a way to gain advertising revenue in breach of its Charter but never admits to doing so.
Whichever Government is in power, it seeks to mollify whilst pretending to be impartial so that this outdated and unjustified licence fee remains in place so that the BBC’s top executives can go on overpaying themselves.
Clearly a sugary drinks tax would help curb or lower the incidence of some obesity but not all of it and Dr Alf is right to ask his wider question.
The solution is multifaceted but for starters must include:
–Variable taxes on all food and drink sufficiently high as to force people to eat the right things
–Removal of excess fat,sugar and salt at the manufacturing stage with stiff penalties on food manufacturers who do not comply
–Removing E-numbers and harmful chemicals like Bisphenol A from fertiliser, the food chain, packaging,till rolls and tins
–Banning Aspartame,Fluoride and Aluminium in foodstuffs,cooking utensils ,toothpaste and deodorants
–Re introducing minimum levels of PE in all schools
–Promoting diets that work such as the 5/2 fasting diet which is now my way of life
–Stopping people from drinking on an empty stomach which causes depression and comfort eating late at night
–Making City Centres well policed car free areas like Saltzburg in Austria where people either walk in or are bussed in to the centre
–Educating the public about the benefits of walking,exercise and vitamin supplementation
–Refusing surgery to the morbidly obese,smokers and heavy drinkers until they lose weight and mend their ways
–Promoting traditional marriage in the tax system.(Married people live longest,people living alone are prone to ill health and die soonest unless they are committed spinsters)
The BBC with its very high proportion of gay employees is keen not to talk about this
–Promoting outdoor sporting activity and Tai Chi for older people along with ballroom dancing but not on that dreadful excuse for a television programme presented by Sir Bruce Forsyth who truly belongs in a museum
–Improve labelling on food and dink