Mexico's sugary drinks tax has helped cut consumption after just three years

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-05/b-msd050420.php

News Release 6-May-2020
BMJ


Introducing a sugary drinks tax in Mexico seems to have helped reduce consumption of soft drinks after just three years, finds a study published by The BMJ today.

Mexico has some of the highest levels of diabetes, overweight, and obesity in the world. From 1 January 2014, Mexico implemented an excise tax of 1 peso per litre (approximately 10% increase in price) on sugar sweetened drinks aimed at reducing consumption.

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The researchers found that after the implementation of the tax, the probability of becoming a non-consumer increased by 4.7 percentage points, and the probability of being a low consumer increased by 8.3 percentage points.

What's more, the probability of being in the medium and high levels of soft drink consumption decreased by 6.8 percentage points for medium consumers and 6.1 percentage points for high consumers.

Stronger associations were seen in participants with secondary school and higher education than in those with elementary school or less.

Being a health worker's cohort, results may not reflect the behavior of the whole Mexican population. Also, this is an observational study, so it cannot establish causality, and the researchers cannot rule out the possibility that estimates may be due to other unmeasured factors.

Nevertheless, their results remained unchanged and the strength of the associations increased after further analyses, suggesting that the findings withstand scrutiny.

As such, they say taxes on sugar sweetened drinks are an effective means of deterring consumption, and they suggest that further increases to the tax "could encourage further reductions in the very high consumption levels in Mexico."

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