Today the nonprofit Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF) fired back at the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene for its hyperbolic "Don't drink yourself fat" PSAs. The newest commercial features over-the-top imagery, inappropriately insinuating that enjoying sugar-sweetened beverages like soda and sweetened tea leads to gangrene and cancer.
Center for Consumer Freedom Senior Research Analyst J. Justin Wilson issued the following statement in response to the latest ad:
Mayor Bloomberg and the New York Department of “Hype” are on a seemingly endless quest to demonize and regulate anything and everything that tastes good. Maybe Bloomberg should cut to the chase and outlaw fun while he's at it. What’s worse is that taxpayers are the ones footing the bill for Bloomberg’s crusade against all things tasty.
The latest shock-and-awe campaign is so ridiculous that the Board of Health’s own nutritionists disagree with the argument that drinking a sugar-sweetened beverage leads weight gain. That’s because study after study has demonstrated that soda is not a unique contributor to obesity. All foods and drink should be enjoyed in moderation, not banished by government regulators.
It doesn't take a Ph.D. in Nutrition to realize that eating or drinking too much of anything is unhealthy; it only takes a little common sense and personal responsibility, which are both apparently foreign concepts to Bloomberg's "food police." New Yorkers don’t need the government to waste thousands of dollars on disgusting ads to tell them to eat healthier. Let’s hope for New Yorkers’ sake that this is the last of Mayor Bloomberg’s cringe-inducing commercials.
