Sugar-sweetened beverage tax in Malaysia: a content analysis of commentaries posted on facebook and Malaysia online news / Muhammad Faiz Mohd Hanim

Objectives: This qualitative and quantitative cross-sectional study using the netnography technique aims to explore general perception and opinion among Malaysians towards the online news portal and news articles’ respond regarding SSBs tax. Methods: Online news articles published on popular online news portal and online commentaries from November 2018 to August 2019 after the announcement and implementation of SSBs tax were downloaded using NCapture and imported into NVivo for analysis using the inductive approach and thematic content analysis. Results: A total of 62 news articles and 2070 total readers’ comments were analysed. Most of the articles portrayed (46.8%) positive stance to SSBs tax which highlighted the health impacts towards people (40.3%). Further analysed by categorised into two timeframes (after announcement and implementation), articles portrayed more positive stance to SSBs tax in both timeframe (43.9% and 52.4%) respectively. The most presented arguments in supporting SSBs taxation were the positive health gain by reducing SSB consumption among the people (25.8%) followed by taxation will increase the government revenue and help reducing burden cost of treatment associated with NCDs (12.9%). However, 8.1% of articles argued that SSBs tax will increase the operating cost toward the manufacturer. Health justification (35.5%) especially risk of diabetes (21%), impact on general health (19.4%) and obesities (4.8%) were used as consideration to introduce the tax. On the other hand, majority of the commentaries were opposing the taxation (60.9%) which highlighted SSBs taxation will increase the price of sugary drinks (13.6%). Additionally, 4.8% of the comments proposing to increase awareness rather than introducing SSBs tax. Despite this, 19.6% support SSBs tax for the positive health benefit when reducing consumption of SSB. Furthermore, it is also found that there is no significant association between online news articles’ slant on SSB tax and online reader commentaries’ slant. Conclusions: The online news articles were written in positive slant towards the implementation of SSBs tax in Malaysia. This suggest that the media had played their role in supporting the health policy. Despite the positive content of online news articles, the commentaries posted on the news articles, was opposing the tax although the evidence of harmful sugar were portrayed in the online news articles as justification to introduce the tax.