{"id":369,"date":"2012-06-20T11:10:43","date_gmt":"2012-06-20T09:10:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/?p=369"},"modified":"2015-04-27T22:40:39","modified_gmt":"2015-04-27T20:40:39","slug":"u-cant-drink-this","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/u-cant-drink-this\/","title":{"rendered":"U can’t drink this"},"content":{"rendered":"

New York City is often considered the most liberal part of the United States, but you wouldn’t know it from the way it’s run. Signs tell you “Don’t even think of parking here”. Police issue tickets for jaywalking<\/span>. Smoking in parks<\/a> is forbidden. Now New Yorkers may be forced to consume less sugar.<\/p>\n

Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s plan<\/a> is to get the health department<\/span> to forbid the sale of soft drinks<\/span> in sizes larger than 16 ounces (0.5 liters).<\/p>\n

“Sugary drink consumption is a key driver of the obesity<\/span> epidemic in the US and in New York. And it is an epidemic. Nearly 60 percent of adult New Yorkers and 40 percent of our children are overweight or obese,” Bloomberg said. “Each year, an estimated 5,800 New Yorkers die because they are overweight or obese.”<\/p>\n

Too big?<\/h2>\n

Fast-food restaurants, movie theaters and convenience stores<\/span> sell soft drinks in sizes up to and beyond 50 ounces. Value for money is a very important virtue<\/span> in America, and the few cents’ difference between drink sizes often equates to<\/span> a lot more cola. Americans also put a lot of ice in their cups, so they’re not really drinking as much as the cup can hold. But still, any large beverage<\/span> is a lot of beverage.<\/p>\n

A newspaper ad in favor of the mayor’s proposal showed a picture of a 32-ounce soft drink next to the 26 packs of sugar that are dissolved<\/span> in it. The text underneath warned that “sugary drinks can bring on<\/span> obesity, type 2 diabetes and heart disease.”<\/p>\n

The simple solution would just be to take out the sugar or dilute<\/span> it with artificial sweeteners. However, as this column has noted before<\/a>, the sugar lobby is very powerful. Further, the public is distrustful of artificial sweeteners \u2014 ironically because of perceived<\/span> health risks.<\/p>\n

Most importantly, Americans generally believe that they should be free to make their own choices, even if what they choose is bad for them.<\/p>\n

Gulp!<\/h2>\n

So will anything come of this?<\/p>\n

Well, first, the ban may happen, even though 53 percent of New Yorkers are against it. New York was one of the first cities in the world to ban smoking in public places, and it hasn’t looked back since. Alcohol is regulated strictly.<\/a> There’s not going to be a referendum, and the city council<\/span> isn’t even involved. Bloomberg, who’s currently on his third term of office<\/span>, is probably not going to run<\/span> for mayor again, so his popularity doesn’t matter. And because New Yorkers are generally thinner and healthier than many other Americans, they may, in the end, consent to<\/span> drinks having 300 calories instead of 600.<\/p>\n

However, there are lots of ways of getting around the ban. Free refills of drinks are common at restaurants, and where refills aren’t offered, people could just buy another drink. “They’re going to just buy two or three cups instead,” Dilip Chaudhari, manager of a 7-Eleven convenience store in Manhattan told The New York Times<\/i><\/a>. “If anything, pollution will go up with all the extra cups people might buy.”<\/p>\n

Chaudhari is unlikely to be affected, though, since it looks like convenience stores will be exempted<\/span>. He will continue to be able to sell the 30-ounce Big Gulp<\/span>, along with its cousins Super Big Gulp (40 ounces) and Double Gulp (50 ounces). The company’s website claims these drinks are “genetically engineered to quench<\/span> even the most diabolical<\/span> thirst”.<\/p>\n

If 7-Eleven is that scientific about it, maybe the company can produce genetically engineered humans capable of<\/span> digesting<\/span> all that sugar.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

New York City is often considered the most liberal part of the United States, but you wouldn’t know it from the way it’s run. Signs tell you “Don’t even think of parking here”. Police issue tickets for jaywalking. Smoking in parks is forbidden. Now New Yorkers may be forced to consume less sugar. Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s plan is to get … >><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[159],"tags":[51,156,144,108],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=369"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1741,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/369\/revisions\/1741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=369"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=369"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/fascinating-america.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=369"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}