Diabetes and obesity have been becoming increasingly common disorders in many countries, especially among younger ages such as children. This of course adversly affect their movement, health and quality of life. For that reason, governments should cut down the portion of soft drinks and sugary snacks in school cafeterias, and instead to provide multiple options of other healthy snacks like fruits, tasty salads and more appealing protein snacks.
While banning them completely looks like an easier decision, it will also increase the desire within children to break the rule and end up buying these unhealthy snacks from external providers like supermarkets, and possibly their own homes too. For instance, when I was a volunteer in 2018 at a children’s summer camp, children were obsessed with Skittles and they would buy multiple packets a day which lead kids to have toothaches a lot. Parents complained to the cafeteria owner about the incidents, and then the owner decided to stop selling them. The next day a few children whose parents were indifferent about the issue, brought skittles and even started selling them at the camp. But when the owner brought only small amounts of Skittles, and promoted other healthier options, children started considering the other snacks too.
For issue as serious as diabetes and obesity, instead of burdening children of making decisions that are even tempting for us as adults, governments should invest in educating parents and teachers on the dangers of the over consumption of the fizzy drinks and other sugary snacks at school, also how easily children can fall into their own desires.
In summary, I believe the best option on the table to prevent the rates of diabetes and obesity to rise to these unbelievable rate, government should be responsible to cutdown the availability of the unhealthy snacks and fast food at schools.