If you want to see and witness legislative action to address Health and Health Equity just explore how Canada has taken on Tobacco. Despite countless reports and warnings Canada refuses to use Tobacco Tactics to address Diabetes and JunkFood consumption. They have funded reasearch on weight Loss Surgery. Paul Murphy
This
report originally aired on February 16, 2014.
MARTIN
FLETCHER: Every Sunday in
Mexico City tens of thousands answer their president’s challenge: to exercise
one hour a day. Mexico’s health ministry says its citizens are too fat.
Yoga
class along the city’s main Reforma Avenue. Nearby, Zumba. Five straight hours
of Latin American dance and aerobics. All overseen by Horacio de la Vega,
a Mexican pentathlete in two Olympics.
You see
that 30 percent of people in Mexico are obese and 70percent are
overweight.
HORACIO
DE LA VEGA, MEXICO CITY INSTITUTE OF SPORT: Yes.
MARTIN
FLETCHER: And
you’re an Olympic athlete. How do you feel about that?
HORACIO
DE LA VEGA: It’s
a very important problem. It’s sad that we actually came to this point. It’s
painful, but it has a lot to do with education, with the culture, and we’re
trying to make a lot of efforts to make this revert.
MARTIN
FLETCHER: We
met Diana Cardona at the Zumba dance. At barely five feet, this thirty year old
mother has struggled with her weight her whole life. Zumba has helped her lose
20 pounds — she’s hoping to lose 20 more. The Zumba class is certainly
hard to resist — a catchy part of what Mexico calls its three pillars to fight
obesity.
So this
is the pillar number one: more exercise for the people. I think I’ve lost a
little bit of weight. Maybe.
After
more sport comes number two: a healthier diet. But it’s pillar number three
that has the whole world watching.
Taxation
of junk food. With one and a half billion people overweight around the globe,
Mexico’s battle of the bulge has become a test case in the fight against
obesity. The new taxes are: eight per cent on food high in saturated fat, sugar
and salt, like sweet breads and cakes. About nine per cent on sugary
drinks like cola.
LUIS
VIDEGARAY, SECRETARY OF FINANCE AND PUBLIC CREDIT, MEXICO: We’re doing a lot of
education programs, health programs to change the habits of people, but we are
also using incentives, and taxes can be powerful incentives. I’m an economist,
so I believe in incentives, and I think this should have an effect on how
people select what to drink and what to eat.
MARTIN
FLETCHER: Commercials
pound the message: exercise and eat healthy, every day, similar to the New York
anti-obesity message of former Mayor Michael Bloomberg. And that’s no
coincidence. Bloomberg’s philanthropic organization has pledged $10 million
dollars to help finance Mexico’s anti-obesity campaign.
Jorge
Romo, chief lawyer for Mexico’s beverage industry association, says that since
the taxes were introduced January the first this year, consumption is already
down five per cent — but he believes it will go up again.
JORGE
ROMO, MEXICAN NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF SOFT DRINKS AND CARBONATED WATER: We are not convinced that
by putting a new tax for soft drinks, in addition to other taxes that they
already pay, it’s going to be a solution. And the reason is that it’s an old
customs — custom in Mexico to drink soft drinks.
MARTIN
FLETCHER: But
that’s exactly the point, isn’t it? To reduce the consumption of sugar because
sugar leads to obesity.
JORGE
ROMO: Yes,
but if you taxed only the drinks which are bottled, then why not the other
ones? There is an unequitable situation. And in talking of equity, that’s a
main reason that the tax might be unconstitutional, because you cannot tax some
product and the other ones not.
MARTIN
FLETCHER: What
Romo’s getting at: the new tax only levies extra pesos on bottled or canned
soft drinks and packaged snacks, not the fatty foods and drinks sold on the
street.
Still
Mexicans drink more Coca Cola products per capita than anyone else in the
world. Visiting a mobile health clinic, Maria Castillo has had hypertension for
23 years and diabetes for five.
How much
Coca Cola do you drink every day?
For the
family, three liters she says.
Three
liters a day? Three liters of Coca Cola, so it’s one liter a day each person
more or less?
She says,
yes it’s bad. And tortilla and bread. That’s what makes us fat.
Mexico’s
Coca Cola franchise declined our interview request. But industry lawyer Romo —
who represents Coke among other brands — says the soft drink companies aren’t
the only culprits in the obesity crisis.
But it’s the
amount of sugar — there is so much sugar in these drinks.
JORGE
ROMO: Maybe
it is the amount of sugar, but if it is the only energy they consume, they eat
or they drink, so no problem. And if they exercise no problem at all. It’s very
expensive to buy fruit, to buy vegetables, so they only eating fried food.
MARTIN
FLETCHER: With
fifty percent of Mexicans living below the poverty line, cost is critical.
Doesn’t
it just make it more expensive for the people who can’t afford to buy anything
else?
LUIS VIDEGARAY,
SECRETARY OF FINANCE AND PUBLIC CREDIT, MEXICO: But there are alternatives.
The taxes — the taxes are only taxing high calorie foods and sugary drinks.
There are other foods and other drinks available that are not being taxed, and
we want exactly that shift in consumption patterns.
MARTIN
FLETCHER: Perhaps
easier said than done, especially in a country where even locals shy away from
the tap water, often leaving bottled drinks as the only option.
Back at
home, Diana from Zumba class has changed her eating habits over the past year.
The children eat rice, tomatoes, peas, tortilla, and guacamole. A year ago it
was fries, takeaway pizzas, hamburgers, cans of cola. If she hadn’t gone on the
diet, she says, I’d be this big! And she feels better. Look at the badge behind
her.
‘Me
siento magnifico.’ That’s
Spanish for ‘I feel magnificent.’
DIANA
CARDONA: Whoo!
Si! Yes!
MARTIN
FLETCHER: It’s
too early to say what the effect of taxation will be as a tool against obesity.
Even its supporters say an increase of eight to ten percent is just not enough,
but the government argues it’s the message that counts. Healthy eating saves
lives.
In a
local initiative by Mexico City, for those who don’t go to the gym, the gym
comes to them. Three hundred so-called urban gyms were set up last year, three
hundred more will be opened this year, and the same again next year.
With
medical and psychological advice, and check-ups, all provided free by the city.
Prevention, the mayor says, is cheaper than treatment.
Maria
Gonzales is the city psychologist in charge of these urban gyms.
MARIA
GONZALES, MEXICO CITY GOVERNMENT: We want the people to be healthy.
MARTIN
FLETCHER: And
when you see the people come to you, are they healthy?
MARIA
GONZALES: Most
of them no. But they come here and they start wanting to have a better way of
living. A healthy life, a healthy style of living.
MARTIN
FLETCHER: The
biggest challenge is to start them young – all research shows that if a child
is overweight at age five, most always will be. Esperanza and Citlali are five
– they don’t know much about new taxes – but the government says higher taxes
on junk food will make families buy less – and their children will be
healthier, and live longer.
