Slapping a 20 percent tax on soda in Britain could cut the number of obese adults by about 180,000, according to a new study.
Though the number works out to a modest drop of 1.3 percent in obesity, scientists say that reduction would still be worthwhile in the U.K., which has a population of about 63 million and is the fattest country in Western Europe. About one in four Britons is obese.
Researchers at Oxford University and the University of Reading estimated a 20 percent tax on soft drinks would reduce sales by 15 percent and that people would buy beverages like orange juice, milk and diet drinks instead. They said the tax would have the biggest impact on people under 30, who drink more sugary drinks than anyone else. No funding was provided by any advocacy or industry groups for the study, published online Thursday in the journal, BMJ.
"Every possible alternative that people would buy is going to be better than a sugary drink," said Mike Rayner of Oxford, one of the study authors. "(The tax) is not a panacea, but it's part of the solution."
Rayner acknowledged the government might shy away from introducing such a hefty tax at a time when the economy is still shaky. Last year, Britain's Conservative-led coalition had to backtrack on a sales tax it planned to levy on fat-laden meat pies after a public outcry.
Such soft drink taxes have been used or considered elsewhere, including France, Mexico, Norway and some U.S. states, but previous analysis of them have found mixed results on people's drinking habits.
In the past, the U.K. has relied on convincing businesses to make their products healthier as opposed to resorting to taxes; that strategy reduced salt levels in processed foods by 20 to 50 percent.
Last week, Britain announced another government-led initiative, in which several major food companies promised to cut the amount of saturated fat in their products. Critics slammed the deal and said the U.K. shouldn't rely on voluntary measures to fight the country's growing waistlines.
"We are at the mercy of these (food and drink) companies," said Tam Fry, spokesman for the National Obesity Forum. Fry was not linked to the BMJ study and said the proposed 20 percent tax would be a hard sell. Instead, Fry said the government should simply fine companies if they exceed a certain threshold for the amount of sugar allowable in food and drink.
"Companies should be coerced with fiscal measures rather than punishing the consumer with taxes," Fry said. "We are in such a predicament with obesity in this country that we have to put the pussy-footing measures to one side," he said. "It's time for the stick to come out."
HIV to ?{ tc?q?sels in the blood. But the antibody approach may someday help doctors attack virus that's hiding in infected cells, beyond the reach of today's drugs, said the Nature commentary by Dr. Steven Deeks of the University of California, San Francisco, and Dr. Louis Picker of the Oregon Health & Science University in Beaverton.
In theory, antibodies might activate the body's immune system to kill those infected cells, they wrote. Barouch's results hinted at such an effect, they noted. Virus levels dropped faster in the monkeys than they do when people get standard HIV drugs, and when the monkey virus returned, it generally didn't reach its pre-treatment levels. Barouch also found virus levels reduced in cells and tissues after treatment.
The findings of the two studies are "provocative" about prospects for attacking HIV's hiding places, Deeks said in a telephone interview.
"These studies raised more questions than they answered," he said. "But that's how science advances."
so-b?fn?q?s.0pt; font-family:"Verdana","sans-serif";mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#333333;mso-fareast-language:EN-GB'> law and ethics at Oxford University, believes children couldn't possibly have the capacity to make an informed decision about euthanasia since even adults struggle with the concept.
"It often happens that when people get into the circumstances they had so feared earlier, they manage to cling on all the more," he said. "Children, like everyone else, may not be able to anticipate how much they will value their lives if they were not killed."
There are others, though, who argue that because Belgium has already approved euthanasia for adults, it is unjust to deny it to children.
"The principle of euthanasia for children sounds shocking at first, but it's motivated by compassion and protection," said John Harris, a professor of bioethics at the University of Manchester. "It's unfair to provide euthanasia differentially to some citizens and not to others (children) if the need is equal."
And Dr. Gerlant van Berlaer, a pediatric oncologist at the Universitair Ziekenhuis Brussels hospital, says the changes would legalize what is already happening informally. He said cases of euthanasia in children are rare and estimates about 10 to 100 cases in Belgium every year might qualify.
"Children have different ways of asking for things, but they face the same questions as adults when they're terminally sick," van Berlaer said. "Sometimes it's a sister who tells us her brother doesn't want to go back to the hospital and is asking for a solution," he said. "Today if these families find themselves (in that situation), we're not able to help them, except in dark and questionable ways."
The change in the law regarding people with dementia is also controversial.
People now can make a written declaration they wish to be euthanized if their health deteriorates, but the request is only valid for five years and they must be in an irreversible coma. The new proposal would abolish the time limit and the requirement the patient be in a coma, making it possible for someone who is diagnosed with Alzheimer's to be put to death years later in the future.
In the Netherlands, guidelines allow doctors to euthanize dementia patients on this basis if they believe the person is experiencing "unbearable suffering," but few are done in practice.
Dr. Patrick Cras, a neurologist at the University of Antwerp, said people with dementia often change their minds about wanting to die.
"They may turn into different people and may not have the same feelings about wanting to die as when they were fully competent," he said. "I don't see myself killing another person if he or she isn't really aware of exactly what's happening simply on the basis of a previous written request (to have euthanasia). I haven't fully made up my mind but I think this is going too far."
Penney Lewis, a professor and medical law expert at King's College London, agreed that carrying out euthanasia requests on people with dementia once they start to worsen could be legally questionable.
"But if you don't let people make decisions that will be respected in the future, including euthanasia, what you do is encourage people to take their own life while they have the capacity or to seek euthanasia much earlier," she said.
In the past year, several cases of Belgians who weren't terminally ill but were euthanized — including a pair of 43-year-old deaf twins who were going blind and a patient in a botched sex change operation — have raised concerns the country is becoming too willing to euthanize its citizens. The newest proposals have raised eyebrows even further.
"People elsewhere in Europe are focused on assisted dying for the terminally ill and they are running away from what's happening in Belgium," Lewis said. "If the Belgian statutes go ahead, this will be a key boundary that is crossed."