Has the Mexico sugar tax worked?

Stuff reports: A professor in population health has told Stuff’s daily podcast Newsable the government is “ignoring the facts” when it comes to policies that could tackle the country’s shocking obesity rates. “New Zealand is falling behind,” Boyd Swinburn, from the University of Auckland, said, pointing to Latin America as a leading example. “They have [a] sugary […]

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Stuff reports:

A professor in population health has told Stuff’s daily podcast Newsable the government is “ignoring the facts” when it comes to policies that could tackle the country’s shocking obesity rates.

“New Zealand is falling behind,” Boyd Swinburn, from the University of Auckland, said, pointing to Latin America as a leading example.

“They have [a] sugary drinks tax, they have junk food taxes, they have marketing restrictions to children – they’re taking the problem seriously. We just don’t care about it. If you look at our policies, we’re doing nothing.”

But has the policies in Mexico for example worked? Sure they reduce the product being taxed, but do people just substitute? The public health activists cite models of reduced obesity but almost never refer at actual real obesity data. So I checked the OECD data.

What a huge success. Gone from a 34% obesity rate to 45%.

The post Has the Mexico sugar tax worked? first appeared on Kiwiblog.