What could we do, and what should we not do, to improve public health? This Blog has postings from public health experts on issues such as efficiency, equity, interventions, politics, cost effectiveness and much more.
Tuesday, February 9th, 2016 | Kate Sloane | No Comments
Prof Nick Wilson, Dr Caroline Shaw, Dr Nhung Nghiem, Prof Tony Blakely, A/Prof Ralph Chapman
Tax policies have major impacts on society and designing such policies is complex. But if 
the perspective is around gaining health and saving costs for the public health system, then certain tax reforms may be favoured more than others. In this blog we take a brief look at what potential there is for revising the NZ tax system from a public health perspective.
Thursday, February 4th, 2016 | Kate Sloane | 1 Comment
Dr Andrea McDonald, Dr Cristina Cleghorn, Prof Nick Wilson, Prof Tony Blakely
Last month the British Medical Journal published a study on the highly anticipated purchasing data examining the impact of taxing sugar sweetened beverages (SSB) in Mexico (1). This study reported that the 10% tax on SSBs was associated with an overall 12% reduction in purchases and a 4% increase in purchases of untaxed beverages one year after implementation. In this blog we examine this latest study, how it fits in with existing evidence, and how these results might apply to improving the control of obesity and improving child oral health in New Zealand.