Shropshire experts back fizzy drinks 'danger' label

Nigel Hunt, dean of the Royal College of Surgeons' dental faculty, revealed this week that the situation has reached "crisis" point with children having to wait up to a year to have rotten teeth removed because so many need treatment.

Experts have recommended that in a bid to improve the situation, labels could be added to sweets and drinks to warn parents about the dangers it could put their children's teeth in – and Shropshire professionals agree.

According to new figures, hospitals have to run extra operations in the evenings and at weekends to deal with the 46,500 children admitted every year to have teeth removed under general anaesthetic after they decayed because of excessive consumption of sugary drinks and sweets. Almost a third of five-year-olds in England have some tooth decay, according to latest figures.

Damian Edwards, sales and marketing manager of Perfect Profiles dental clinic in Wolverhampton, which sees a number of Shropshire patients, said: "It is no secret that there has been a significant increase in the number of children with dental issues which can easily be put down to their lifestyle and food choices.

"The majority of our patients, who are all 18-years-old and above, are needing treatment exacerbated by their diets from when they were children and sugar content wasn't monitored or reported as it is today."

The faculty of dental surgery has produced an action plan to tackle the problem of tooth decay in children suggesting parents should be expected to get their child's personal health record, known as the red book, signed to confirm that they have taken them to the dentist.

Children should then visit the dentist at least once a year. Almost 40 per cent of children in England did not see a dentist between December 2013 and December last year.

Stuart Henderson of Ideal Fitness, a personal training company based at Stafford Park in Telford, said the idea could work – but more importantly people need to have a balanced diet.

He said: "I think pictures on packets of sugary sweets and foods should put people off eating them. But this does run the risk of purely displaying sweets as bad for you – they don't have to be bad for you if they are part of a healthy balanced diet.

"This could go too far and turn a lot of people against them. People need to have the education and information to make a decision themselves instead of simply being told that something is bad for them or good for them – it is not black and white like that."

John Gentle, superintendent pharmacist at The Pharmacy@Caxton in Oswald Road, Oswestry, welcomed the move.

He said: "As a company concerned about the health of people across Shropshire I welcome any moves to improve this. When the images came in on cigarette packages we did see a slight increase in people enquiring about stopping smoking and the aids that are available."