New York’s Ban On Over-Sized Sugary Drink Targets Obesity

Big servings of sugary soft drinks may be injurious and unhealthy, but should they also be illegal? New York City's mayor Mike Bloomberg thinks so and the City has passed the first U.S. ban of jumbo sugary drinks in its most recent notorious step to lessen obesity and its lethal complications in a nation with a huge weight problem.

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By an 8-0 vote with one abstention, the city health board banned sugary drinks bigger than 16 ounces nearly everywhere except for grocery stores and super stores. Violators of the ban will face a $200 fine.

Planned as a push to urge the city towards healthier behavior, the ban hopes to normalize unhealthily supersize servings and persuade people to think twice before gulping down sugar laden drinks.

Despite being endorsed by both Michelle Obama and Bill Clinton, Bloomberg's plan that turned into a ban has met with a ferocious response both from businesses and from some New Yorkers, who hate being treated like kids.

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Opponents, who cast the issue as a breach on individual freedom and called NY Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who proposed the ban in May, an overbearing nanny, declared to prolong their fight.

"It's sad that the board wants to limit our choices," Liz Berman, a business owner and chairwoman of New Yorkers for Beverage Choices, a beverage industry-sponsored group, said in a statement. "We are smart enough to make our own decisions about what to eat and drink."

This ban has stimulated a lot of public debate, the New York Times called the proposal "a ban too far,” while major business interests have also hit back, with a Coca-Cola spokesperson calling the ban an "arbitrary mandate" and commenting that "New Yorkers expect and deserve better than this".

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On Twitter, Bloomberg heralded the measure's passage as "the single biggest step any government has taken to curb #obesity. It will help save lives."

Health Commissioner Thomas Farleysaid, “If the law results in shrinking only one sugary drink per person every two weeks from 20 ounces to 16 ounces, New Yorkers could collectively prevent 2.3 million pounds gained per year. This would slow the obesity epidemic and prevent much needless illness."

Kelly Brownell, director of Yale University's Rudd Center for Food Policy & Obesity, said there was "quite a good chance" that other U.S. cities would once again follow New York's lead and replicate the idea that activated opponents' anger and questions about the Bloomberg's headship.

"It doesn't seem so crazy any more. You need somebody to go first," Brownell told Reuters.

Arguing the ban will hurt small businesses; opponents had a poll by the New York Times, which reported 60 percent of New Yorkers believe the ban is a bad idea.

But the Health Department said that most of the unexpected response it received to the initiative, 32,000 of nearly 39,000 oral and written comments, were in favor of the restriction.

Dr. Deepthiman Gowda, an internist who teaches at Columbia University, called "a small step but a bold step and an important one."

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Almost one-third of Americans are overweight, and about 10 percent of the nation's healthcare bill is tied to obesity-related diseases, such as Type 2 diabetes, heart disease and hypertension, according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.

According to the recently available data from The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, obesity rates among Americans will continue to rise. The OECD projects more than two out of three people will be overweight or obese in some developed countries by 2020.

If outsized drinks are a constructing block of this addictive state, it definitely makes sense to control their sale. Such state control may displease many, but these bans may at least support and encourage people to look with a critical eye at the huge portions they guzzle!