Controversy continues on health recommendations and cider festivals

The PDO and Otea: “Putting an eye on campaigns or festivals promoting cider unduly criminalizes their moderate and responsible consumption”

LA SIDRA.- Two organizations of the country, OTEA and the Protected Designation of Origin Sidra de Asturies have given their opinion in a statement after the presentation of the results of the IV Health Survey for Asturias on Public Health recommendations to public institutions in which the public investments to festivals of cider and beer are put in question, since they foment unhealthy habits. Below we publish his position:

“Both from Otea and from the PDO Sidra de Asturias we did not discuss the technical conclusions of the study at all, but we are surprised and annoyed that the comment about the Beer or Cider festivals has been included in the presentation of their conclusions. We believe that it has been a somewhat unfortunate statement because both cider and beer are, precisely, the drinks that have the lowest alcohol content in the market. We understand that there are much more necessary and urgent actions to reduce alcoholism among Asturian society, such as the fight against the bottle where, indeed, the consumption of alcohol is worrisome.

Putting an eye on campaigns or festivals promoting cider unduly criminalizes their moderate and responsible consumption, pointing directly to consumers who prove once again to be the most aware and respectful to themselves and also to others.

 There is also a recently created Decalogue, where the Association of Sidra Asturiana clearly expresses what are the norms that the sector defends for the promotion of cider in Asturias, a reason to reiterate the inopportunity that the idea of that cider is one of the causes of the spread of alcoholism among consumers in the Principality of Asturias.

But it is that, in the case of natural cider, we have to consider that we are talking about a drink whose moderate consumption can be healthy and with many beneficial properties for health, as stated in the conclusions of the research work carried out in 2015 by the Department of Functional Biology of the University of Oviedo in collaboration with the CR DOP Sidra de Asturies and in which it explains that: It elevates the vital tone, the affective tone and improves the cognitive processes. In addition, moderate consumption exerts a protective function of the vascular system against some pathologies “.