Chicago Alderman Edward Burke (14) has introduced a proposed ordinance that would prohibit the distribution of energy drinks in the city. Citing the popularity of the drinks among teenagers and young adults and the dangers they purportedly pose to health, the ordinance defines “energy drink” as “a canned or bottled beverage which contains an amount of caffeine exceeding or equal to 180 milligrams per container and containing Taurine (2-aminoethanesulfonic acid) or Guarana.” The proposed ordinance also states that those violating the ordinance would face fines of $100 to $500 per offense with a mandatory revocation or suspension of business licenses for repeat offenders. Some legal commentators and critics reportedly claim that the proposed ban is rife with legal flaws and misrepresentations about the law regarding energy drinks and that the ambiguity surrounding the regulation of these products needs to be addressed. The proposal was assigned to the City Council Committee…
California EPA’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) has issued a notice of its intent to list the chemical bisphenol A (BPA) as a reproductive toxicant under the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (Prop. 65). The agency has proposed the action “under the authoritative bodies listing mechanism,” noting that the National Toxicology Program—Center for the Evaluation of Risks to Human Reproduction published a report in 2008 concluding that “the chemical causes developmental toxicity in laboratory animals at high levels of exposure.” Comments are requested by February 25, 2013. OEHHA has also proposed adopting a maximum allowable dose level (MADL) for BPA of 290 micrograms per day. Comments on this proposal are requested no later than March 11, 2013. According to the agency, “Some businesses may not be able to afford the expense of establishing a MADL and therefore may have to defend litigation for a…
The U.K. Food Standards Agency (FSA) will reportedly prosecute a department store for installing raw-milk vending machines at its flagship London location. According to a January 23, 2013, FSA press release, the agency has sought charges against Selfridges Retail Limited as “a person other than the occupier of a production holding or distributor” under Regulation 32 and Schedule 6 Paragraph (2)(1) of the Food Hygiene (England) Regulations. FSA has also included the farmer who supplied the milk as “an occupier of a production holding” under Regulation 32 and Schedule 6(2)(2). Westminster Magistrates Court has set the hearing date for February 6, 2013. The vending machines reportedly came to FSA’s attention in 2011, when the agency initiated an investigation of the retailer and demanded that the unpasteurized milk products carry a warning label. Under current regulations, farmers in England, Wales and Northern Ireland can sell raw cow’s milk directly to consumers…
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service and the Food and Drug Administration have announced a February 5, 2013, public meeting in Washington, D.C., to provide information and receive public comments on draft U.S. positions for discussion during the 23rd Session of the Codex Committee on Fats and Oils of the Codex Alimentarius Commission in Langkawi, Malaysia, on February 25-March 1, 2013. Agenda items include a proposed draft standard for fish oils, proposed draft amendment to parameters for rice bran oil in the standard for named vegetable oils, discussion paper on the revision of the limit for campesterol in the Codex standard for olive oils and olive pomace oils, and discussion paper on cold-pressed oils. See Federal Register, January 23, 2013.
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has requested public comments on the information collection provisions of regulations that “require registration for domestic and foreign facilities that manufacture, process, pack, or hold food for human or animal consumption in the United States.” According to FDA, the Public Health Security and Bioterrorism Preparedness and Response Act of 2002 requires food facilities to provide information via Form FDA 3537 (§1.231) or the electronic Food Facility Registration Module that will support FDA’s enforcement activities and help the agency issue notifications in the event of accidental or deliberate contamination. In 2011, the Food Safety Modernization Act amended these regulations to compel facilities to renew their registrations biennially and to submit additional information, such as “the email address for the contact person of a domestic facility and the email address of the U.S. agent for a foreign facility.” Based on the registrations received in previous years,…
A recent study investigating weight bias in the courtroom has apparently concluded that both the “weight and gender of a defendant may affect juror perceptions of guilt and responsibility.” N. A. Schvey, et al., “The influence of a defendant’s body weight on perceptions of guilt,” International Journal of Obesity, January 2013. The study relied on responses from 471 lean and overweight adults “who read a vignette describing a case of check fraud while viewing one of four images (a lean male, a lean female, an obese male or an obese female)” and then “rated the defendant’s culpability on a 5-point Likert scale and completed measures of anti-fat attitudes.” According to the study, “male participants judged the obese female defendant as significantly guiltier than the lean female defendant,” although female respondents “judged the two female defendants equally regardless of body weight.” Lean male participants also apparently believed that “the obese female defendant…
New research from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) reportedly indicates that the number of emergency room (ER) visits involving energy drinks has doubled nationwide—from about 10,000 to more than 20,000—from 2007 to 2011. The statistics were gathered through the Drug Abuse Warning Network. “Consumption of energy drinks is a rising public health problem because medical and behavioral problems can result from excessive caffeine intake,” according to the report. “A growing body of scientific evidence documents harmful health effects of energy drinks, particularly for children, adolescents and young adults.” Among other things, the report also indicated that people ages 18 to 25 accounted for the largest group of ER patients, and men accounted for about two-thirds of those treated. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is reportedly considering the findings in its broad review of the safety of energy drinks this spring. See The DAWN Report: Update on Emergency…
Research based on the International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Childhood (ISAAC) Phase Three has reportedly linked fast food consumption to asthma and eczema severity in kids. Philippa Ellwood, et al., “Do fast foods cause asthma, rhinoconjunctivitis and eczema? Global findings from the International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Childhood (ISAAC) Phase Three,” Thorax, January 2013. Analyzing data from more than 319,000 13- to 14-year-old adolescents in 51 countries and more than 181,000 6- to 7-year-old children in 31 countries, the study evidently relied on written questionnaires that asked participants about their asthma, rhinoconjunctivitis and eczema symptoms, as well as their dietary habits. In addition to “a potential protective effect on severe asthma… associated with consumption of fruit ≥3 times per week,” the results allegedly found that children and adolescents who consumed fast food three or more times per week had an increased risk of severe asthma, severe rhinoconjunctivitis…
A recent study has reportedly claimed that low exposures of a bisphenol A (BPA) alternative known as bisphenol S (BPS) also disrupt estrogen, raising questions about the chemical’s impact on human health. Rene Vinas and Cheryl Watson, “Bisphenol S Disrupts Estradiol Induced Nongenomic Signaling in Rat Pituitary Cell Line: Effects on Cell Functions,” Environmental Health Perspectives, January 2013. University of Texas researchers apparently sought to “characterize the non-genomic activities of BPS” at low doses by examining how it mimics “the effects of physiologic estrogens via membrane-bound estrogen receptors” in rat pituitary cells, “alone and together with the physiologic estrogen estradiol (E2).” The results evidently showed that, like BPA, BPS “disrupts membrane-initiated E2-induced cell signaling, leading to altered cell proliferation, cell death, and PRL [prolactin] release.” According to the study’s authors, BPS has replaced BPA in some thermal papers and plastics because it is “less likely to leach from plastic containers with…
Wall Street Journal columnist Carl Bialik recently authored two related articles questioning whether body mass index (BMI) is a reliable data point insofar as it “lumps together all body mass, including bone, muscle and beneficial fat, rather than singling out the more dangerous abdominal fat, which most researchers see as the real threat to health.” In particular, Bialik focuses on a recent U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) report finding that out of 2.9 million people involved in 97 studies, those participants whose BMI classified them as overweight had a 6 percent lower risk of death than those classified as normal weight. But Bialik notes that several scientists have since criticized the results of CDC’s report, partly because threshold BMIs in the mid-to-high 20s tend to paint “a wide range of body types… with the same brush.” He adds that Pennington Biomedical Research Center Executive Director Steven Heymsfield,…
