Will soda soon fizz out in America?

Already slogging through a decade-long sales decline, more bad news soaked the soft drink sector in recent weeks. A new study claimed sipping soda ages you as fast as smoking cigarettes. Coca-Cola reported a 14 percent profit dip. Then, Friday, reports surfaced that the man who played Santa Claus in some of Coke’s TV ads had died — sad, but also perhaps a touch symbolic.

If soft drinks are similarly bound for product purgatory, how long until the soda bubble finally bursts — for good?

At PepsiCo, CEO Indra Nooyi warned in 2013 that a breakthrough in natural soda sweeteners was desperately needed because: “If you let this go too long, another three or five years, the consumer will walk away.”