Author Interviews, BMJ, Sugar, Weight Research / 02.11.2013

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Adam D M Briggs Academic Clinical Fellow British Heart Foundation Health Promotion Research Group, Nuffield Department of Population Health, University of Oxford, Oxford OX3 7LF, UK MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings of the study? Answer: For the first time this study estimates the impact of a sugary drinks tax in the UK on obesity. We estimate the tax would reduce the number of adults with obesity by around 180,000 or just over 1% of all adults who are obese, and the number of adults who are either overweight or obese by 285,000. The greatest reductions are seen in young adults. We also estimate that the effects of the tax will be similar across all income groups.
Author Interviews, General Medicine, McGill, Sugar, Weight Research / 09.08.2013

MedicalResearch.com  Interview with: Caroline Franck, MSc Dvisions of Cardiology and Clinical Epidemiology McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings of the study? Answer: We found that, although subsidies are needed to protect farmers from production risks, the current allocation of payments encourages the sustained overproduction of a handful of grains and oilseeds. Overproduction contributes to making the end products cheaper, which are then processed into energy-dense and high-fat/sugar foods. Obesity should be treated as a systems problem, in which farm production plays an important role.