‘Firms who push sugary food are killing by stealth’

MANUFACTURERS, marketers and supermarkets selling sugarfilled foods and drinks to children were accused of “murder by stealth” last night.

Those responsible for pushing products like chocolate, sweets, biscuits and sugary breakfast cereals should be dragged before the courts, said a leading campaigner.

Joan Taylor, of De Montfort University, Leicester, a leading authority on diabetes research said: “Marketing high-sugar content products should be a punishable offence because it is murder, or at least manslaughter, by stealth.”

The toll of sweet treats on public health has been catastrophic, she said. There are now almost four million people living with diabetes in the UK and 90 per cent of them have potentially fatal Type 2, which is fuelled by obesity.

A further 12 million are at increased risk because of their weight and unhealthy lifestyles.

Latest NHS figures show that in 2016/17 there were 617,000 hospital admissions where obesity was a factor – an increase of nearly one fifth in a year.

Experts have called for an extension of the sugar tax to cover the foods fuelling the epidemic.

In April the Government slapped a tax on sugary drinks with shoppers now paying 18p or 24p more a litre, depending on how much has been added.

Analysis shows a similar tax on unhealthy food would encourage 47 per cent of us to cut back on the amount we eat.

Mintel found it was likely to have an even greater influence on young consumers with the figure rising to 53 per cent of 16 to 34-year-olds.

The call for comprehensive legislative action comes just a week after the Daily Express exposed how record numbers of children were being struck down with Type 2.

There are now 6,836 sufferers under the age of 25. The figure is 10 times the number first feared.

More than one child in five is obese or overweight in their first year of primary school, rising to one in three by the time they leave.

Tam Fry, chairman of the National Obesity Forum, said: “Professor Taylor is quite right. Food manufacturers who stuff excessive quantities of sugar into their products should be held accountable. They know full well the damage that sugar may cause yet plead that their customers demand it.

“The same was said for fizzy drinks until the sugary drinks industry levy came along. But faced with hefty levies, company bosses stripped sugar from their products more or less overnight and few, if any, are complaining.”

Campaigners argue the sugar tax should be immediately extended to food and drinks not subject to the levy, like milkshakes, some of which are rammed with as much as 16 teaspoons of sugar.

Supermarkets regularly advertise promotions aimed at children with family packs of branded chocolate and biscuits available for just

£1.

Campaigners want all labelling of added sugars to be marked in teaspoons rather than grams and a ban on all sugary drinks advertising on TV and the internet. Type 2 diabetes is a lifelong condition that leads to serious complications such as blindness, amputations, heart disease and kidney failure. NHS consultant cardiologist Dr Aseem Malhotra said: “I fully back Professor Taylor’s calls. For decades the food industry has been in effect killing for profit.”

4m people in the UK suffer from Type 1 or Type 2 diabetes 12m are at risk of obesity-fuelled Type 2 diabetes