Being overweight appears to increase the risk of having severe COVID symptoms.
Governments around the world may therefore increase the size and scope of their sugar taxes.
Ensuring food is affordable during the pandemic is more important than sugar taxation, but priorities may soon change.

Weight Emerges as a COVID Risk Factor

When COVID first emerged in early 2020, a major symptom was a cough/breathlessness, sometimes leading to pneumonia or acute respiratory distress syndrome.
Doctors assumed COVID was a respiratory disease and the treatment of critically ill patients focussed on increasing blood oxygen levels, often through ventilation.

It now seems that COVID can also lead to increased risk of strokes, organ damage (notably heart, liver and kidneys as well as lungs), excessive clotting, and septic shock.
People with underlying health conditions seem to have worse COVID outcomes than those without.
One such underlying condition is being overweight.

Public Health England has carried out a review of existing COVID studies and concluded that being overweight increases the risk of serious illness and death.
UK government statistics show that nearly 8% of critically ill patients in intensive care units with the virus are morbidly obese, compared with 2.9% of the general population.
The World Obesity Federation are also concerned that obese patients are harder to treat effectively:

They are more difficult to intubate;
It can be more challenging to obtain diagnostic imaging as there are weight limits on imaging machines;
Patients are more difficult to position and transport for nursing staff.

We think governments around the world will seek new ways to improve the health of their populations.
This means the battle against sugar and fat in food and drinks will intensify.

The Squeeze on Sugar Continues

We are already seeing the first tentative steps being taken in the United Kingdom.
David Cameron’s government had commissioned a study on how to reduce obesity in 2016.
But he abruptly left office after the UK voted to leave the European Union and Theresa May’s government did not carry out many of the recommendations made by the study.
Boris Johnson’s government has revisited the study in July 2020, perhaps influenced by Johnson’s own treatment in intensive care for COVID.

A ban on TV and online adverts for food high in fat, sugar, and salt before 9pm.
Limits on in-store promotions for unhealthy foods.
Calorie labelling on restaurant menus and alcoholic drinks.

At this stage, the UK government is not making changes to its existing sugar tax, which is applied only to sugar-sweetened beverages.
But we fear this might change in the coming months.

The aim had been to improve population health, and with COVID this becomes even more urgent.
We therefore expect more countries to apply taxes on sugary foods in the coming months.

We also expect countries that have sugar taxes in place to widen their scope.
For example, in the UK, the tax only applies to sugar-sweetened beverages but may be expanded to cover baked goods and confectionery.

This may pose problems for major food and beverage companies.
Sugar doesn’t just provide sweetness; it also has other uses which make it a valuable ingredient.
For example, it acts as a preservative, provides bulk and an attractive texture, and caramelises when heated.
It’s not going to be easy for companies to reformulate their food products to avoid sugar taxes in the way they could for sugar-sweetened beverages.

But many governments around the world have spent heavily to keep economies afloat during COVID-induced lockdowns in 2020.
At its peak, around 25% of the British workforce was furloughed and so receiving 80% of their normal wage from the government rather than their employers.
These governments have been able to take advantage of near-zero interest rates to fund their expenditure, but increased taxation also seems likely in the future.

We don’t expect these changes to happen quickly.
Governments are extremely sensitive to the cost of food given the economic damage inflicted by the response to COVID, including widespread job losses.
We therefore don’t expect major changes to sugar taxation in the short-term.
There will be plenty of time for the debate around sugar taxes to intensify as we move into 2021 and beyond.