Fat Tax, Fat Chance
It’s surfaced again. The long-running debate on a fat-tax. My own professional body, the British Medical Association debated the issue 10 years ago. I vividly recall receiving a letter from a member of the public pleading with me not to support it. She was, she wrote, unhealthily fat. She was used to being abused and ridiculed. She was, in her words, “already being punished enough” and the last thing she needed was to have to pay more for the food that she ate.
As a nation we don’t have the best of diets. As few as one fifth of us manage to eat our recommended five portions of fruit and veg a day. We exercise too little. As a result 26% of men and women in this country are clinical obese, and as many as two thirds of us are overweight. But obesity is not just a medical problem. It’s a social problem. The biggest preventable risk to you becoming obese is not the cost of a burger or a bag of chips. It’s where you live. It’s the job you do. It’s the choices you have. A fat tax would be unfair on those who most need the help it is supposed to create.
So the news that the Danish government has proposed that any food product which has more than 2.3% saturated fat should be taxed in order to tackle their obesity problem got me going again. I was invited on to BBC Radio 4’s Eddie Mayer show to contest it. I made it clear that I think this “fat-tax” is unfair, unmanageable, and won’t work. I was invited to have a second go in the Daily Mirror the following day. Fat, saturated or not, is fat. Saturated fat is less healthy that unsaturated fat, but it’s no less calorific. Equally of concern is the amount of salt and sugar in the food that we buy. But a fat tax won’t do anything to reduce that.
What I’ve learned over the years is that behaviour doesn’t change through criticism. It changes through understanding, and opportunity. A fat-tax might well reduce consumption of unhealthy foods in the short term. But there is no proof that it will have any impact on obesity levels whatsoever. Wouldn’t it be better to look at reducing taxation on healthy foods, to create an incentive, to make it easier for everyone to afford them? At the moment you don’t pay VAT on a piece of fruit. But you do if it’s been processed. So fruit juice and smoothies already have a kind of fat-tax and are regarded by many people as prohibitively expensive.
We have to make it easier for those at risk to live healthier lives. And that means addressing the fundamental underlying social and economic causes. Not punishing those who have already fallen through the net. Yes, it’s about personal responsibility. But it’s a shared responsibility too. Ok, I’m stepping off my soap box now…………..
Dr Ian Campbell
Fat Tax, Fat Chance
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By Dr Ian Campbell October 2011
It’s surfaced again. The long-running debate on a fat-tax. My own professional body, the British Medical Association debated the issue 10 years ago. I vividly recall receiving a letter from a member of the public pleading with me not to support it. She was, she wrote, unhealthily fat. She was used to being abused and ridiculed. She was, in her words, “already being punished enough” and the last thing she needed was to have to pay more for the food that she ate.
As a nation we don’t have the best of diets. As few as one fifth of us manage to eat our recommended five portions of fruit and veg a day. We exercise too little. As a result 26% of men and women in this country are clinical obese, and as many as two thirds of us are overweight. But obesity is not just a medical problem. It’s a social problem. The biggest preventable risk to you becoming obese is not the cost of a burger or a bag of chips. It’s where you live. It’s the job you do. It’s the choices you have. A fat tax would be unfair on those who most need the help it is supposed to create.
So the news that the Danish government has proposed that any food product which has more than 2.3% saturated fat should be taxed in order to tackle their obesity problem got me going again. I was invited on to BBC Radio 4’s Eddie Mayer show to contest it. I made it clear that I think this “fat-tax” is unfair, unmanageable, and won’t work. I was invited to have a second go in the Daily Mirror the following day. Fat, saturated or not, is fat. Saturated fat is less healthy that unsaturated fat, but it’s no less calorific. Equally of concern is the amount of salt and sugar in the food that we buy. But a fat tax won’t do anything to reduce that.
What I’ve learned over the years is that behaviour doesn’t change through criticism. It changes through understanding, and opportunity. A fat-tax might well reduce consumption of unhealthy foods in the short term. But there is no proof that it will have any impact on obesity levels whatsoever. Wouldn’t it be better to look at reducing taxation on healthy foods, to create an incentive, to make it easier for everyone to afford them? At the moment you don’t pay VAT on a piece of fruit. But you do if it’s been processed. So fruit juice and smoothies already have a kind of fat-tax and are regarded by many people as prohibitively expensive.
We have to make it easier for those at risk to live healthier lives. And that means addressing the fundamental underlying social and economic causes. Not punishing those who have already fallen through the net. Yes, it’s about personal responsibility. But it’s a shared responsibility too. Ok, I’m stepping off my soap box now…………..
Tags: Food, Health, News