Manufactured food and drink usually focus on the taste to grab more customers neglecting the healt concerns of the consumers. This has led to excessive use of sugar in such products. There is a notion that governments should make such products more expensive to save the people, which I do not agree with.
Companies that make products that are not good for the health, also spend money on advertisement very aggressively. Imposing more tax on such products may reduce the sales of such commodities and the amount of revenue generated may also reduce. In this way, such corporations may become weaker, resulting in lesser budget for advertisement of such products. Such a condition may reduce the sales even more.
On the contrary, while imposing more tax on harmful products is a standard practice of the governments all over the world, it has not been effective in many cases. For example, the tobacco industry is the highest tax paying industry in Bangladesh. Even though they are spending a large portion of their revenue on paying taxes, their sales has also increased significantly. Both sugary products and tobacco products are addictive to the people. If the companies are able to get a person accustomed to having their unhealthy products regularly, there is a very low chance that they will stop consuming it after the prices rise.
Moreover, the idea of increasing the price of a product based on the will of the government is contradictory with the ideas of an open market and the freedom of the citizens. The price of a commodity is supposed to be fixed by the supply and demand. Interferance of the government in determing the price of a product is not expected in a free market.
To summarize, although increasing the price of unhealthy products may have some advantages, such policy is usually found to be ineffective and also violates the freedom of the citizens. A more effective measure to tackle this problem may be to raise awareness about the health problems caused by sugar.