A soft drink is any water-based flavored drink, usually but not necessarily carbonated, and typically including added sweetener. Flavors used can be natural or artificial. The sweetener may be a sugar, high-fructose corn syrup, fruit juice, a sugar substitute, or some combination of these. Soft drinks may also contain caffeine, colorings, preservatives and other ingredients.
A sugar substitute is a food additive that provides a sweetness like that of sugar while containing significantly less food energy than sugar-based sweeteners, making it a zero-calorie or low-calorie sweetener. Artificial sweeteners may be derived through manufacturing of plant extracts or processed by chemical synthesis. Sugar substitute products are commercially available in various forms, such as small pills, powders, and packets.
"Junk food" is a term used to describe food that is high in calories from macronutrients such as sugar and fat, and often also high in sodium, making it hyperpalatable, but with insufficient dietary fiber, protein, or micronutrients such as vitamins and minerals. It is also known as "high in fat, salt and sugar food". The term junk food is a pejorative dating back to the 1950s. Many variations of junk food can be easily found in most supermarkets and fast-food restaurants. Due to easy accessibility, commercially-oriented packaging, and often-low prices, people are likely to consume it.
A healthy diet is a diet that maintains or improves overall health. A healthy diet provides the body with essential nutrition: fluid, macronutrients such as protein, micronutrients such as vitamins, and adequate fibre and food energy.
The nutrition facts label is a label required on most packaged food in many countries, showing what nutrients and other ingredients are in the food. Labels are usually based on official nutritional rating systems. Most countries also release overall nutrition guides for general educational purposes. In some cases, the guides are based on different dietary targets for various nutrients than the labels on specific foods.
Kelly David Brownell is a clinical psychologist and scholar of public health and public policy at Duke University whose work focuses on obesity and food policy. He is a former dean of Duke's Sanford School of Public Policy. Noted for his research dealing primarily with obesity prevention, as well as the intersection of behavior, environment, and health with public policy, Brownell advised former First Lady Michelle Obama's initiatives to address childhood obesity and has testified before Congress. He is credited with coining the term "yo-yo dieting", and was named as one of "The World's 100 Most Influential People" by Time Magazine in 2006.
A fat tax is a tax or surcharge that is placed upon fattening food, beverages or on overweight individuals. It is considered an example of Pigovian taxation. A fat tax aims to discourage unhealthy diets and offset the economic costs of obesity.
Food marketing is the marketing of food products. It brings together the food producer and the consumer through a chain of marketing activities.
Diet plays an important role in the genesis of obesity. Personal choices, food advertising, social customs and cultural influences, as well as food availability and pricing all play a role in determining what and how much an individual eats.
A sugary drink tax, soda tax, or sweetened beverage tax (SBT) is a tax or surcharge designed to reduce consumption of sweetened beverages by making them more expensive to purchase. Drinks covered under a soda tax often include carbonated soft drinks, sports drinks and energy drinks. Fruit juices without added sugar are usually excluded, despite similar sugar content, though there is some debate on including them.
Added sugars or free sugars are sugar carbohydrates added to food and beverages at some point before their consumption. These include added carbohydrates, and more broadly, sugars naturally present in honey, syrup, fruit juices and fruit juice concentrates. They can take multiple chemical forms, including sucrose, glucose (dextrose), and fructose.
Sugar-sweetened beverages (SSB) are any beverage with added sugar. They have been described as "liquid candy". Consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages have been linked to weight gain and an increased risk of cardiovascular disease mortality. According to the CDC, consumption of sweetened beverages is also associated with unhealthy behaviors like smoking, not getting enough sleep and exercise, and eating fast food often and not enough fruits regularly.
Coming Together is a 2-minute ad created and distributed by the Coca-Cola Company and launched on the night of January 14, 2013, on several cable networks.
The National Policy and Legal Analysis Network to Prevent Childhood Obesity, or NPLAN for short, is a nonprofit organization funded by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and which, according to its website, plays an important role in the Foundation's effort to reverse the obesity epidemic by 2015, a commitment that was announced in 2007. Their partners include, in addition to the RWJF, Active Living by Design and the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity at Yale. They are run by ChangeLab Solutions, originally known as Public Health Law and Policy, which focuses not only on obesity but also on tobacco regulation. The NPLAN advocates for a soda tax, specifically an excise tax, and have published model legislation which earmarks the funds raised to go to programs to prevent and treat obesity. According to the American Public Health Association, they provide "legal technical assistance focused on childhood obesity prevention policy." The Network has also "developed model menu labeling ordinances, requiring chain restaurants to post calorie and other nutrition information on menus." NPLAN has advocated for the use of licensing and zoning laws to "shape the way land is used and how businesses operate," and has praised regulations requiring nutrition standards on foods sold in snack machines in schools. According to their website, they "work on four broad issue areas: healthy community food systems, healthy schools, healthy land use planning, and food marketing." The American Bar Association's director of public health and policy Marice Ashe wrote the following soon after the NPLAN's founding was announced: "NPLAN will serve as an incubator where lawyers, policymakers, advocates, and scientists collaborate to produce legal and policy tools and resources. As research and products are developed, NPLAN will also operate as a national one-stop source for access to practical, efficient, and effective legal technical assistance products."
Mary Story is Professor of Global Health and Community and Family Medicine, and director of Education and Training, Duke Global Health Institute at Duke University. Dr. Story is a leading scholar on child and adolescent nutrition and child obesity prevention.
Marlene B. Schwartz is the current director of the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Health at the University of Connecticut.
Sugar is heavily marketed both by sugar producers and the producers of sugary drinks and foods. Apart from direct marketing methods such as messaging on packaging, television ads, advergames, and product placement in setting like blogs, industry has worked to steer coverage of sugar-related health information in popular media, including news media and social media.
Chile's food labelling and advertising law, formally titled Ley 20.606, sobre la composición de los alimentos y su publicidad establishes a regulatory framework on food security and healthy food with the intention of guiding consumers towards behaviour patterns that promote public health. After the 2012 law was enacted, its accompanying regulations came into full force on June 27, 2016. Andrew Jacobs, writing for The New York Times, has characterized this measure as "the world’s most ambitious attempt to remake a country’s food culture" and suggests it "could be a model for how to turn the tide on a global obesity epidemic that researchers say contributes to four million premature deaths a year."
Jerold Robert Mande is an American nutritionist, public policy expert, and civil servant who served as Deputy Under Secretary for Food Safety at the US Department of Agriculture, in charge of the Food Safety and Inspection Service, from 2009 to 2011. He has held numerous other senior positions in executive branch agencies and universities.
Rebecca M. Puhl is a researcher in the field of weight bias.
