Health Care Professionals Say No to Sugar–Sweetened Beverages
Across the country, the health care community is taking steps to eliminate sugary beverages and increase access to tap water within their facilities. By signing the petition below, you will join with the hospitals, health care professionals and health advocates nationwide who are addressing one of the primary contributors to obesity and related diseases.
We, the undersigned nurses, doctors, dietitians and other health professionals, support the efforts of the healthcare sector to reduce consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages. We applaud steps that health care organizations are taking to promote healthier beverages, and healthier communities.
Sugar-sweetened beverages* contain large amounts of added sugar. Americans now consume an average of 200 to 300 more calories each day than we did 30 years ago. Nearly half of these calories come from sugar-sweetened drinks, which can contain as many as 16 packets of sugar in a 20-ounce bottle and a staggering 26 packets in a 32-ounce served up in environmentally hazardous plastic bottles. The empty calories from these drinks foster obesity and diabetes. A child’s risk for obesity increases an average of 60 percent with every additional daily serving of soda. As an alternative, filtered water hydration stations are a healthy and environmentally responsible option.
