Child Beverage Consumption

The Michael & Susan Dell Center for Healthy Living is developing a series of reports, Healthy Children, Healthy State, to raise awareness of child health risk factors in order to develop new programs and actions, and to build on current initiatives in Texas. The Child Sugar-Sweetened Beverage   one-pager showcases the current state of sugar-sweetened beverage consumption for children in Texas.

This report was last updated on August 4, 2025 and utilizes the 2021-2023 Texas SPAN data. 

Highlights

• Children and adolescents should drink plain water and plain pasteurized milk, and avoid consuming sugar-sweetened beverages for optimal health.
• 78% of school-aged children and adolescents in Texas consumed at least 1 sugar-sweetened beverages in a day.
• 18% of 2^nd graders, 31% of 4^th graders, 30% of 8^th graders, and 29% of 11^thgraders consumed 3 or more times sugar-sweetened beverages yesterday.

Past Reports

• 2019-2020 SPAN data
• 2015-2016 SPAN data