Soft Drinks - America

The addict feels low. His body needs a boost. He reaches into his pocket and finds a dollar bill. He slides it into the machine and a can rolls out. He opens the can and guzzles. He feels his energy return. His fix will last a couple of hours, enough to keep him alert for the rest of the morning. The addict is twelve years old and his drug is a soft drink, purchased from a vending machine in his school. This addict and thousands like him will attend special classes, sponsored by his school, to warn him about the dangers of drugs, tobacco and alcohol. But no one will tell him about America's other drinking problem.

According to the National Soft Drink Association (NSDA), consumption of soft drinks is now over 600 12-ounce servings (12 oz.) per person per year. Since 1978, soda consumption in the us has tripled for boys and doubled for girls. Young males age 12-29 are the biggest consumers at over 160 gallons per year-that's almost 2 quarts per day. At these levels, the calories from soft drinks contribute as much as 10 percent of the total daily caloric intake for a growing boy.

TARGETING THE YOUNG

Huge increases in soft drink consumption have not happened by chance-they are due to intense marketing efforts by soft drink corporations. Coca Cola, for example, has set the goal of raising consumption of its products in the US by at least 25 percent per year. The adult market is stagnant so kids are the target.

Soft drink companies spend billions on advertising. Much of these marketing efforts are aimed at children through playgrounds, toys, cartoons, movies, videos, charities and amusement parks; and through contests, sweepstakes, games and clubs via television, radio, magazines and the internet. Their efforts have paid off. Last year soft drink companies grossed over $57 billion in sales in the us alone, a colossal amount.

In 1998 the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) warned the public that soft drink companies were beginning to infiltrate our schools and kid clubs. For example, they reported that Coca-Cola paid the Boys & Girls Clubs of America $60 million to market its brand exclusively in over 2000 facilities. Fast food companies selling soft drinks now run ads on Channel One, the commercial television network with programming shown in classrooms almost every day to eight million middle, junior and high school students. In 1993, District 11 in Colorado Springs became the first public school district in the us to place ads for Burger King in its hallways and on the sides of its school buses. Later, the school district signed a 10-year deal with Coca-Cola, bringing in $11 million during the life of the contract. This arrangement was later imitated all over Colorado. The contracts specify annual sales quotas with the result that school administrators encourage students to drink sodas, even in the classrooms. One high school in Beltsville, Maryland, made nearly $100,000 last year on a deal with a soft drink company.

EARLY WARNINGS

Warnings about the dangers of soft drink consumption came to us as early as 1942 when the American Medical Association's (AMA) Council on Food and Nutrition made the following noble statement:

"From the health point of view it is desirable especially to have restriction of such use of sugar as is represented by consumption of sweetened carbonated beverages and forms of candy which are of low nutritional value. The Council believes it would be in the interest of the public health for all practical means to be taken to limit consumption of sugar in any form in which it fails to be combined with significant proportions of other foods of high nutritive quality."

Since that time the first notable public outcry came in 1998, 56 years later, when the CSPI published a paper called "Liquid Candy" blasting the food industry for "mounting predatory marketing campaigns [especially] aimed at children and adolescents." At a press conference, CSPI set up 868 cans of soda to represent the amount of soda the average young male consumed during the prior year. For additional shock effect, CSPI displayed baby bottles with soft drink logos such as Pepsi, Seven-up and Dr. Pepper, highlighting a study that "found that parents are four times more likely to feed their children soda pop when their children use those logo bottles than when they don't." In "Liquid Candy" CSPI revealed that even though, over a period of fifty years, soft drink production increased nine times and by 1998 ".provided more than one-third of all refined sugars in the diet, . . . the AMA and other health organizations [remained] largely silent."

INGREDIENTS IN SOFT DRINKS-A WITCH'S BREW

High Fructose Corn Syrup, now used in preference to sugar, is associated with poor development of collagen in growing animals, especially in the context of copper deficiency. All fructose must be metabolized by the liver. Animals on high-fructose diets develop liver problems similar to those of alcoholics.

Aspartame, used in diet sodas, is a potent neurotoxin and endocrine disrupter.
Caffeine stimulates the adrenal gland without providing nourishment. In large amounts, caffeine can lead to adrenal exhaustion, especially in children.
Phosphoric acid, added to give soft drinks "bite," is associated with calcium loss.
Citric acid often contains traces of MSG, a neurotoxin.
Artificial Flavors may also contain traces of MSG.
Water may contain high amounts of fluoride and other contaminants.