You may have heard recently that it is now illegal for unlimited fizzy drinks to be sold in France because of the concerns over obesity.
Apparently in France obesity is becoming more of an issue and the government has introduced this new law in a bid to reduce the risk to children from becoming overweight and having health issues when they grow up.
I have to question this law because I have 2 children age 9 & 12 who like most children love fizzy drinks. When we go out to family restaurants it is often the case that they are offered free refills of fizzy drinks as part of their meal deal.
I don’t mind this because dining out is a treat and not a daily occurrence. I feel it is fine for them to over indulge sometimes as long as they aren’t allowed to do it on a regular basis. When they are at home all of the drinks are sugar free and they can’t just keep filling up all day long anyway.
I really feel it is the responsibility of the parents to educate their children into healthy eating and drinking and allow things in moderation. If you take it all away from them they only want it more and then it becomes more of a problem. I had a friend who never allowed her child to eat sweets, cakes chocolate etc so when they went to any of the kids birthday parties he was the one who stood next to the table of food and ate his was through as much as he possibly could where the others who were allowed treats at home enjoyed the party and had some party food when the time came.
Jamie Oliver has been a fantastic role model for healthy eating in the UK and has transformed school dinner menus and offered support and advice to parents to help give their children a balanced diet.
This is what France should be doing rather than targeting one specific area. Maybe they could make sure there are always sugar free drinks available in restaurants so families can still enjoy the fizzy refills but of the sugar free variety. Most restaurants service diet coke but there are no sugar free versions of the other popular drinks.
Disney currently offers free refills with some of their offers which was a huge saving to us when we had our holiday. My kids are not overweight and it hasn’t caused any health issues for them.
A lot of cruise lines are now offering soda packages with unlimited refills but I can’t see them introducing this onto the ships.
What do you think ?
About Me
Hello my name is Ruth and I have worked in the travel industry for 28 years. Apart from a couple of years working in a retail shop the rest of my career has been specialising in cruise so as you can imagine I am an expert in this area. I…
Read more