It's all very well talking about regulating this, that and the other, but it isn't going to happen, especially when you have a government which invites the booze industry to write the regulations for self-regulation (not enforceable legislation). Even in the UK, we have US-style lobbyists now lining the pockets of politicians to get their views heard and on the statute books.
My paternal grandfather was born, raised and spent his whole life on the Indian sub-continent: he died a natural death (no illness) at the age of 110 -- my father and his brothers all lived well into their 80s, my maternal grandparents died in their mid-80s, at a time and in a country where the life expectancy was probably half that. They all ate red meat, smoked tobacco rolled in leaves and worked hard, but everything they put in their bodies was grown by their own hand, no processed foods, no preservatives and no crop dusting.
Everything in moderation is OK, including sugar & salt, but these are probably the two most addictive foods you can buy so they help to sell the products. Without sugar, fizzy drinks taste vile. Try eating food without salt and see how long we last. But mix salt or sugar with other chemicals (E-numbers, anyone), some carcinogenic, which in certain quantities and if taken regularly can actually kill you. Read the label on any fizzy drink and it actually tells you right there (contains xxxxx which can be carcinogenic or words to that effect -- I know this because I designed & produced labels for fizzy drinks at one time).
If the government is being urged to regulate sugar prices to reduce consumption through taxation, the only beneficiaries will be the sugar industry and the politicians and maybe the military/armaments industry because we'll soon be having wars over sugar, which is a very competitive market. The industry can't grow enough cane/beet to meet world demand, wholesale prices are rocketing and crop yields have increased through genetic engineering. My maternal uncles have become rich and enjoy a superb lifestyle on the back of sugar -- they simply installed submerged water pumps for irrigation and turned their hand to growing sugar cane. The sugar plant subsidises some of the initial outlay and collects the harvested cane and all the landowner does is plant the cane, water it and makes sure no-one steals it during the night!
The food industry doesn't have to tell us about all the ingredients used in production, for example, take "preservative P" which is made up of a cocktail of chemicals, including some really nasty toxic stuff. The label only lists "preservative P" but doesn't mention the building blocks some of which taken on their own could kill you. Who is to blame? Government. Supermarkets are now changing sell-by dates to eat-by dates, to whose benefit? Theirs or ours?
The only problem is that eating organic is expensive and no guarantee of purity because fertilisers all contain some form of poison to kill insects and the like, and if these can harm one form of life then why not another? Cattle & sheep are fed steroids and dead animals. Chickens are fed dead chickens. These are not meat-eating creatures, they eat grass and grains. My first proper job (before I had to diversify) was producing animal feeds from prepared recipes and I couldn't believe the sort of chemicals used for fast & extra growth (chick mash and growers mash), to encourage chickens to lay eggs (layers mash) beyond their natural capacity, and so on.
I'll get off the pulpit/soapbox now. Eat safe, eat well, exercise well, enjoy life.
