Thomas-Meyer Molly, Mytton Oliver, Adams Jean
Public Health Department, Essex County Council, Chelmsford, United Kingdom.
Centre for Diet and Activity Research (CEDAR), MRC Epidemiology Unit, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom.
PLoS One. 2017 Nov 22;12(11):e0186750. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0186750. eCollection 2017.
Regular consumption of sugar sweetened beverages (SSBs) is associated with weight gain, type 2 diabetes, and dental caries. The UK will introduce a levy on the manufacturers of SSBs in 2018. Details will be negotiated over the next two years. How the UK public views SSB taxes is likely to be an important determinant of the content and success of the final policy. We aimed to capture the views, ideas and concerns of commenters on major UK news websites on SSB taxes.
We conducted a qualitative analysis of reader comments to online news coverage of one proposal for an SSB tax in the UK. 1645 comments on four articles were included. Three underpinning themes influenced support or opposition to the tax: the balance between individual responsibility and autonomy, and population need; mistrust of the intention of the proposed tax and those promoting it; and variations in the perceived complexity of unhealthy diets and obesity associated with variations in what are considered appropriate interventions. Arguments under each theme were used to justify both support and opposition in different cases.
As the final form of the UK SSB tax is negotiated, effort should be made to address the concerns we identified. Our results suggest these efforts could usefully focus on emphasising the social and environmental determinants of diet and obesity, reinforcing the benefits of the tax to the NHS, and pitching the tax as playing into a variety of different conceptualisations of obesity.
经常饮用含糖饮料（SSB）与体重增加、2型糖尿病和龋齿有关。英国将于2018年对含糖饮料制造商征税。具体细节将在未来两年内协商确定。英国公众对含糖饮料税的看法可能是最终政策内容和成功与否的重要决定因素。我们旨在了解英国主要新闻网站上评论者对含糖饮料税的看法、观点和担忧。
我们对英国一项含糖饮料税提案的在线新闻报道的读者评论进行了定性分析。纳入了对四篇文章的1645条评论。有三个基本主题影响了对该税的支持或反对：个人责任与自主权以及人群需求之间的平衡；对拟征税及其推动者意图的不信任；以及与被认为适当干预措施差异相关的不健康饮食和肥胖认知复杂性的差异。每个主题下的论点在不同情况下被用来为支持和反对提供理由。
在协商英国含糖饮料税的最终形式时，应努力解决我们确定的问题。我们的结果表明，这些努力可以有效地集中在强调饮食和肥胖的社会及环境决定因素、强化该税对国民医疗服务体系（NHS）的益处，以及将该税定位为符合对肥胖的多种不同概念理解上。
