A sugar tax of 50 per cent is needed to drastically change drinking and eating habits, obesity experts have said.

Health professionals on the National Obesity Forum said the 20 per cent rate recommended by Public Health England would be an “insufficient” deterrent for buying sugary drinks.

It means buying a 330ml bottle of coke from a supermarket would rise from 99p to £1.49.

The advice comes as David Cameron hinted last week that the Government could soon introduce a levy on fizzy drinks this year after promising a “fully worked-up programme” for tackling soaring obesity rates in the UK.

Professor David Haslam, chairman of the National Obesity Forum, said: “Anything less than a 50 per cent tax on sugary drinks will be insufficient as a disincentive to consumers.

“We don’t currently support taxing food products… but sugary drinks have no place in anyone’s diet.”

Mr Cameron’s said the consumption of sugary drinks were also contributing to heart disease, cancer and having a detrimental effect on NHS finances.

The amounts of sugar in food and drink Show all 6 1 /6 The amounts of sugar in food and drink The amounts of sugar in food and drink Minstrels A 42g bag contains 28.9g of sugar The amounts of sugar in food and drink Dairy Milk A 49g bar contains 26.8g of sugar The amounts of sugar in food and drink Skittles 45g of Skittles (about a quarter of a large 174g pouch) contains 40.4g of sugar The amounts of sugar in food and drink Ribena A 500ml bottle of Blackcurrant Ribena contains 23g of sugar, down from 50g/500ml after it was reformulated to avoid the government's tax on sugary drinks The amounts of sugar in food and drink Coca Cola A 330ml can of Coca Cola contains 35g of sugar The amounts of sugar in food and drink Innocent Smoothies A 250ml bottle of strawberries & bananas Innocent Smoothie (the middle size) contains 26g of sugar

Approving his own government-ordered report’s recommendation of introducing a 20 per cent levy on sugar drinks would signal a U-turn by Mr Cameron, who ruled out the prospect of a sugar tax as recently as October.

His spokeswoman said there were “more effective ways of tackling this issue than putting a tax on sugar”.



At a press conference on Thursday, Mr Cameron said: "I don’t really want to put new taxes onto anything.

"But we do have to recognise that we face potentially in Britain something of an obesity crisis when we look at the effect of obesity on not just diabetes but the effect on heart disease, potentially on cancer, we look at the costs on the NHS, the life-shortening potential of these problems.