Cornwall, Wiltshire and Bristol amongst top 15 authorities nationwide where the total savings and health benefits of a sugary drinks duty would be highest

A sugary drinks duty could save the South West of England NHS and public health budgets over £30 million

New research, published by the Children's Food Campaign in association with University of Liverpool academic Brendan Collins and Food Active, shows that if the government introduced a 20 pence per litre sugary drinks duty in England, then the impact in the South West of England over twenty years would be to:

reduce the cases of diabetes by nearly 5,500
prevent over 800 cases of bowel cancer
reduce strokes and cases of coronary heart disease by almost 3,500
save the NHS over £1.5 million a year in healthcare costs for treating those diseases
improve the quality of life for tens of thousands of residents

The impact on calorie reduction would be greatest in places such as Swindon, Bristol and South Gloucestershire, which have the highest relative proportion of younger demographics who typically consume the most sugary drinks. The local authorities in South West England set to gain the most total savings and health benefits from a sugary drinks duty are (in order): Cornwall, Wiltshire, Bristol, South Gloucestershire and Plymouth – due partly to their larger population sizes. View the impact in your local area www.childrenshealthfund.org.uk

Sarah Watson, spokesperson for Bournemouth and Poole Sustainable Food City Partnership:

“Part of our work is to improve the health and wellbeing of people across Bournemouth and Poole. We back moves for a sugary drinks duty to be introduced nationally as we feel this would have a positive impact on people’s health, particularly on the lives of our children and young people.”

Malcolm Clark, co-ordinator of the Children’s Food Campaign, said:

“Public health directors in North West England and in Cardiff, as well as the London Health Commission, have publicly backed a sugary drinks duty. We hope this new research encourages public health directors in South West England to join their counterparts in calling for the government to introduce a nationwide duty.”

Table 1: impact of a sugary drinks duty in South West England

This table is in order of greatest health cost savings over a 20 year period

Area Name	Reduction in calories per day-mid	Estimated change in diabetes cases over 20 years	Estimated change in Stroke/CHD cases over 20 years	Estimated change in Cancer cases over 20 years	Estimated QALYs gained over 20 years	Total health cost savings over 20 years
Cornwall UA	6.28	-511	-348	-91	8593	£3,111,309
Wiltshire UA	6.52	-443	-302	-79	7453	£2,698,464
Bristol UA	6.67	-389	-265	-70	6548	£2,370,682
South Gloucestershire UA	6.58	-265	-180	-47	4455	£1,612,888
Plymouth UA	6.54	-246	-168	-44	4146	£1,501,211
Swindon UA	6.71	-205	-140	-37	3447	£1,248,178
North Somerset UA	6.31	-198	-135	-35	3324	£1,203,571
South Somerset CD	6.32	-158	-108	-28	2666	£965,082
Bath and North East Somerset UA	6.47	-155	-106	-28	2615	£946,831
Bournemouth UA	6.43	-148	-101	-26	2492	£902,206
Torbay UA	6.18	-141	-96	-25	2379	£861,270
Poole UA	6.34	-131	-89	-23	2208	£799,336
Gloucester CD	6.67	-126	-86	-23	2124	£768,875
Teignbridge CD	6.20	-121	-83	-22	2038	£738,007
East Devon CD	5.99	-120	-82	-22	2025	£733,252
Sedgemoor CD	6.40	-117	-80	-21	1965	£711,305
Mendip CD	6.50	-109	-75	-20	1840	£666,144
Exeter CD	6.50	-109	-74	-19	1830	£662,507
Stroud CD	6.45	-105	-71	-19	1762	£637,779
Taunton Deane CD	6.41	-102	-70	-18	1719	£622,434
Cheltenham CD	6.53	-93	-63	-17	1558	£564,055
Forest of Dean CD	6.41	-89	-61	-16	1504	£544,689
North Devon CD	6.27	-87	-59	-16	1465	£530,349
West Dorset CD	6.09	-86	-58	-15	1442	£522,087
Tewkesbury CD	6.36	-76	-52	-14	1273	£461,072
South Hams CD	6.17	-74	-50	-13	1245	£450,797
Cotswold CD	6.25	-74	-50	-13	1240	£448,797
East Dorset CD	5.97	-72	-49	-13	1218	£441,003
Torridge CD	6.19	-68	-46	-12	1138	£411,859
Mid Devon CD	6.39	-67	-46	-12	1125	£407,231
Weymouth and Portland CD	6.33	-66	-45	-12	1109	£401,597
North Dorset CD	6.40	-65	-44	-12	1096	£396,648
West Devon CD	6.20	-48	-33	-9	808	£292,459
Purbeck CD	6.17	-46	-31	-8	773	£279,871
Christchurch CD	5.90	-38	-26	-7	631	£228,500
West Somerset CD	5.86	-35	-24	-6	583	£210,916
Isles of Scilly UA	6.03	-2	-1	0	29	£10,470
Totals	6.32	-4986	-3398	-891	83863	£30,363,734

Table 2: Top 15 local authorities in England with greatest cost savings

This table is in order of greatest health cost savings over a 20 year period

Region	Area Name	Reduction in calories per day-mid	Estimated change in diabetes cases (over 20 years)	Estimated change in Stroke/CHD cases (over 20 years)	Estimated change in Cancer cases (over 20 years)	Estimated QALYs gained (over 20 years)	Total health cost savings (over 20 years) (£)
West Midlands	Birmingham MCD	6.84	-1,049	-715	-188	17,651	6,390,832
Yorkshire and The Humber	Leeds MCD	6.62	-801	-546	-143	13,475	4,878,838
North East	Durham UA	6.45	-570	-388	-102	9,582	3,469,422
South West	Cornwall UA	6.28	-511	-348	-91	8,593	3,111,309
Yorkshire and The Humber	Sheffield MCD	6.59	-506	-345	-90	8,507	3,080,144
Yorkshire and The Humber	Bradford MCD	6.82	-500	-341	-89	8,411	3,045,486
South West	Wiltshire UA	6.52	-443	-302	-79	7,453	2,698,464
Yorkshire and The Humber	Kirklees MCD	6.66	-425	-290	-76	7,150	2,588,923
North West	Liverpool MCD	6.65	-405	-276	-72	6,820	2,469,206
North West	Manchester MCD	6.89	-404	-275	-72	6,788	2,457,657
South West	Bristol UA	6.67	-389	-265	-70	6,548	2,370,682
Yorkshire and The Humber	Wakefield MCD	6.53	-362	-247	-65	6,088	2,204,109
Yorkshire and The Humber	East Riding of Yorkshire UA	6.30	-334	-228	-60	5,626	2,037,032
Yorkshire and The Humber	Doncaster MCD	6.55	-332	-226	-59	5,582	2,020,975
North East	Northumberland UA	6.35	-331	-225	-59	5,560	2,012,979

Quality-adjusted life year (QALY) is a measure of the state of health of a person in which the benefits, in terms of length of life, are adjusted to reflect the quality of life. One QALY is equal to 1 year of life in perfect health. It is often measured in terms of the person's ability to perform the activities of daily life, free from pain and mental disturbance.

The Children's Food Campaign is a campaign of Sustain the alliance for better food and farming.

Full data sources and methodology can be viewed at www.childrenshealthfund.org.uk

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Published Wednesday 18 March 2015

Sugary Drinks Duty: Support the campaign for a sugary drinks duty, to pay for programmes to improve childrens health and protect the environment they grow up in.

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