DHB gets sugar out of system

The Canterbury District Health Board reckons it has removed 1.86 tonnes of sugar from its premises in a year simply by putting water instead of sugary drinks in its vending machines.

Since the policy was introduced last year, the board has worked with the owners of vending machines across all of its sites to ensure that healthy food choices make up 70 per cent of what is on offer.

Drink vending machines now contain mostly bottled water, and others contain healthy snacks such as crackers and cheese, soup, muesli bars, pretzels and nuts and raisins.