Ginger ale yes, Pepsi no. Area health system drops some sodas from patients’ menu
If you happen to be a patient at a Virginia Mason Franciscan Health-operated hospital in the area, your beverage menu will not include some soda options such as Coke or Pepsi.
And that’s on purpose, based on a new menu rules handed down from the regional health system’s Chicago-based parent company, CommonSpirit Health.
“Clear sodas,” such as ginger ale or Sprite, are still available for patients.
A tipster recently alerted The News Tribune of the menu change at St. Joseph Medical Center in Tacoma, one of the health system’s hospitals.
Upon checking, VMFH in a statement sent to The News Tribune confirmed the new menu policy.
“Based on CommonSpirit Health’s new food and nutrition guidelines and moving forward, patient floor stock beverages now only include water, tea and coffee (caffeinated and decaf), milk (dairy and non-dairy), and juices (regular and sugar-free),” VMFH said in the emailed statement.
“Sodas are no longer provided in floor stock to patients, with the exception of clear sodas such as Sprite, ginger ale and diet ginger ale.”
The change does not apply to onsite cafeterias and vending machines used by visitors and staff.
The policy is in effect across all of VMFH hospitals in the state, including St. Joseph Medical Center.
Hospitals in the VMFH network include: St. Anne Hospital in Burien, St. Anthony Hospital in Gig Harbor, St. Clare Hospital in Lakewood, St. Elizabeth Hospital in Enumclaw, St. Francis Hospital in Federal Way, St. Joseph Medical Center in Tacoma, St. Michael Medical Center in Silverdale, Virginia Mason Medical Center in Seattle and the Rehabilitation Hospital in Tacoma.
VMFH’s new beverage plan is not an outlier. The move away from sugary sodas at hospitals first came on the national radar more than a decade ago.
Hospitals in California, Ohio, Indiana, Wisconsin, Texas, New Hampshire and Minnesota started dropping various brands in their health systems to help fight high obesity rates, particularly among children.
The New York Times reported in 2019 that a sugary drink ban at University of California, San Francisco led to health benefits among its employees.
in 2018 the National Health Service pulled sugary beverages from hospitals across England.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention note that “Frequently drinking sugar-sweetened beverages is associated with weight gain, obesity, type 2 diabetes, heart disease, kidney diseases, non-alcoholic liver disease, tooth decay and cavities, and gout.”
At Tacoma-based MultiCare Health System, Pepsi is among options available for patients at its hospitals in the area.
Scott Thompson, media representative for MultiCare, told The News Tribune via email that soda choices include Pepsi/Diet Pepsi, Sprite/Diet Sprite and ginger ale.
“We offer 8 ounce versions of all of them,” he added. “Should we have shortage or run out of Pepsi products we use Shasta products as an alternative.”
