According to some British experts, the simple act of placing a jug of water on the table helps prevent obesity by getting children into the habit of not drinking sugary drinks. Experts explain why.
Parents should stop buying fruit juices and sugary drinks for their children and should offer them water, and only ever water, at mealtimes and throughout the day, to limit sugar intake and cut the risk of obesity, hypertension and diabetes. The advice comes from a team of British nutritionists and has been picked up by the country's major newspapers. The experts believe that sugary drinks, including sports drinks, are contributing to the epidemic of childhood obesity currently under way in England.
Despite government guidelines aimed at discouraging sugar consumption being on their way — along with a proposed tax on sugary drinks — Susan Jebb, professor of diet and population health at the University of Oxford and head of negotiations to reach an agreement between the government and the industry, has stated that the most effective thing parents can do in this regard is to keep sugary drinks off the table and put only water on it. "Encourage your children to drink water. Once they have been weaned, children should drink only that," she added.
Avoiding industrially produced drinks, according to the expert, is essential for tackling the problem of obesity, given the clear links between their consumption and the risk of weight gain. "We also have a plausible mechanism for this effect, because liquid calories are known to be less satiating than solid calories — they fill you up less," Susan Jebb explained.
Professor Tom Sanders, head of the diabetes and nutritional sciences division at King's College London, shares this view, adding that the marketing of sugary drinks at sporting events is leading people to believe that drinking something very sweet makes them more active, more athletic. "We have the World Cup going on at the moment. Some of these energy drinks are extremely high in sugar — between 60 and 70 grams in a single bottle," he said. "The way these products are presented and marketed is one of the problems we are encountering."