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Supervisors hear study tying sugary drinks to health costs, continue debate on proposed tax
Summary
Budget analysts told the Board of Supervisors’ Budget & Finance Committee that sugar-sweetened beverage consumption likely imposes $48.1 million in annual costs on San Francisco residents (conservative estimate), while public-health experts and community leaders urged a ballot tax to fund prevention and services targeted to impacted neighborhoods. The committee continued the hearing for further work.
A budget and legislative analyst’s review and a series of public-health presentations on Dec. 11 laid out the health harms and local costs associated with high consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages and set the stage for a proposed voter measure.
Fred Brusseau of the Board’s Budget and Legislative Analyst office said the study used conservative assumptions and local CDC-based population data to estimate the city’s costs. “Using those estimates … we came up with a total of approximately $48,100,000 in annual costs that San Francisco residents are paying for the costs related to excessive sugar sweetened beverage consumption,” Brusseau said during his presentation. He added a…
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