VOA慢速英语：美国城市禁止在儿童菜单中加入含糖饮料

US City Bans Sugary Drinks on Children’s Menus

美国城市禁止在儿童菜单中加入含糖饮料

Recently, Baltimore, Maryland, became the largest city in the United States to ban restaurants from including sodas and other sugary drinks on their menus for children.

最近，马里兰州巴尔的摩市成为美国禁止餐厅在儿童菜单中加入苏打水和其它含糖饮料的最大城市。

Now, Baltimore's restaurants can only offer milk, water or 100 percent fruit juice as drinks with meals meant for children.

现在，巴尔的摩的餐厅只能给儿童提供牛奶、水或是100%纯果汁作为儿童用餐的配套饮料。

At places to eat in the city, boys and girls can still drink soda. But an adult will have to order it for them.

在该市的用餐点，儿童仍然可以喝苏打水，但是必须由成年人为他们购买。

Restaurants failing to obey the new law face a $100 fine.

不遵守新法律的餐厅将面临100美元的罚款。

Doctor Leana Wen is Baltimore's Health Commissioner. She said that the "law will help families make the healthy choice the easy choice."

Leana Wen博士是巴尔的摩的卫生专员。她说，法律将帮助家庭轻松做出健康选择。

"The science is clear," Wen said. "One of the biggest contributors to childhood obesity is sugary drinks." She added that "childhood obesity is a major risk factor for diabetes, heart disease and early death."

Wen表示：“科学很明确，儿童肥胖的最大成因就是含糖饮料。”她补充说，“儿童肥胖是糖尿病、心脏病和早逝最重要的风险因素。”

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that, in Baltimore, one in three school-aged children is obese. CDC officials define obesity as weight that is higher than what is considered as a healthy weight for a given height.

美国疾病控制和预防中心报告称，巴尔的摩有1/3的学童肥胖。美国疾病控制和预防中心官员将肥胖定义为重量超过给定身高的健康体重。

A federal study of Baltimore showed that about one in four schoolchildren drink soda every day.

一项针对巴尔的摩的联邦研究显示，有1/4的学童每天饮用苏打水。

The America Heart Association suggests that children two years of age and older drink no more than one 227-gram soda per week.

美国心脏协会建议2岁及以上年龄的儿童每周饮用苏打水不超过227克。

The CDC website states that nationwide "the percentage of children and adolescents affected by obesity has more than tripled since the 1970s. Records from 2015 and 2016 show that nearly 1 in 5 school-age children and young people (6 to 19 years) suffer from obesity.

美国疾病控制与预防中心网站指出，自上世纪70年代以来，全国范围内受肥胖症影响的儿童和青少年比例增加了两倍以上。2015年和2016年的记录表明，近1/5的学龄儿童和6-19岁的青少年患有肥胖症。

The Restaurant Association of Maryland opposes the new law. It says Baltimore's restaurants are already facing enough business challenges. It warns the law will make those challenges even worse.

马里兰州餐厅协会反对这项新的法律。该协会表示，巴尔的摩的餐厅已经面临了足够多的商业挑战。它警告说，这项法律将会使得这些挑战更为严峻。

Other smaller U.S. cities – seven in California and one in Colorado -- have already banned sodas from children's restaurant menus. However, Baltimore is the first large city to take this step.

美国其它一些较小的城市，其中加州7个城市和科罗拉多州的1个城市已经禁止在儿童的餐厅菜单中使用苏打水。然而，巴尔的摩是迈出这一步的第一个大城市。

Whether or not such bans are approved in other cities, both large and small, remains to be seen.

这类禁令是否会在其它大小城市获批尚有待观察。

I'm Anna Matteo.

安娜·马特奥报道。