Sugary fizzy drinks and yoghurts come under fire
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- Published: Monday, 21 November 2016 07:41
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Soft drinks firms should not be able to claim sugary drinks are part of a balanced diet because most cans contain more sugar than a person's entire daily allowance, researchers have said. Also, yoghurt manufacturers should be shamed into taking some yoghurt pots off shelves and downsize others, the Daily Mail reports.
The soft drinks study was published in BMJ Open and examined the sugar content of 169 types of fizzy drinks in nine major supermarkets being sold in 2014. The average can was found to contain more sugar than the 30g-a-day recommended limit, with 55 per cent of drinks exceeding this level. The authors found a large variation between the same flavoured drinks, with some having just 3.3g of sugar per 330ml can and others having 52.8g - the equivalent of 12 teaspoons.
Supermarkets' own brands often had significantly lower calories than branded products, the study found. Kawther Hashem, co-author of the study and researcher for campaign group Action on Sugar at Queen Mary University of London, said all sugar drinks should be reduced to below the 5g threshold. She also said soft drinks giants should not be able to claim their products could be part of a balanced diet.
It has also been reported that Public Health England, which has been put in charge of part of the Government's Childhood Obesity Strategy, is alarmed that sugary yoghurts are fuelling weight gain. Like fizzy drinks, many flavoured yoghurts are packed with sugar, however they will not be subject to the Government's planned sugar levy. Public Health England has however suggested that manufacturers should cap the size of single serve pots of yoghurt at 125g. It also wants to slash the average amount of sugar in yoghurt from the current figure of 11.05 per cent to 8.8 per cent by 2020. The story was original reported in The Grocer magazine, which listed the amount of sugar in a number of children’s and adult’s yoghurt brands. The Grocer found 43 per cent of all single-serve yoghurts currently fall foul of the PHE proposals.
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