A federal court in California has granted in part and denied in part the motion to dismiss filed by Quaker Oats in consolidated cases alleging that the company falsely advertises products such as granola bars and instant oatmeal containing small amounts of trans fats as healthy. In re: Quaker Oats Labeling Litig., No. 10-502 (N.D. Cal., decided March 28, 2012). According to the court, the plaintiffs’ “primary contention” is that consuming “any amount of artificial ‘trans fat’ is unhealthy, and that therefore various aspects of the labeling on Quaker’s products” are false and misleading under California law. The court earlier determined that some of the claims were preempted by federal law. Additional information about the litigation appears in Issue 369 of this Update. Regarding the plaintiffs’ expanded pleadings, which complain of “various additional statements and images on Chewy Bars, Instant Oatmeal, and Oatmeal To Go Bars,” the court refused to…
The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has released a report recommending best business practices “to protect the privacy of American consumers and give them greater control over the collection and use of their personal data.” Titled “Protecting Consumer Privacy in an Era of Rapid Change: Recommendations for Businesses and Policymakers,” the guidance reportedly expands on preliminary findings first issued in December 2010 and covered in Issue 374 of this Update. In particular, the March 2012 report urges companies to protect consumer privacy by (i) building protections into every stage of product design, including “reasonable security for consumer data, limited collection and retention of such data, and reasonable procedures to promote data accuracy”; (ii) giving consumers a “Do Not Track” mechanism to opt out of data collection; and (iii) providing greater transparency about the collection and use of consumer information. Unlike the preliminary version, which applied its framework to all businesses, the…
First synthesized by a Russian chemist in 1891 and deemed safe by the Environmental Protection Agency in 1976 when grandfathered in along with 62,000 other chemicals under the Toxic Substances Control Act, bisphenol A (BPA) was today confirmed for continued use in food packaging materials by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). According to news sources, the agency rejected the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) petition to ban the chemical, finding that the scientific evidence cited in the petition cannot be applied to humans, and the studies were too small or involved injecting BPA into animals rather than ingested over time, which is how human exposure occurs. See The New York Times, March 30, 2012. Produced at an annual rate of more than 8 billion pounds worldwide, BPA has been detected in the urine of nearly every adult and child tested in the United States, and, while it is quickly…
A recent meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies has claimed that “higher white rice consumption was associated with a significantly elevated risk of type 2 diabetes.” Emily Hu, et al., “White rice consumption and risk of type 2 diabetes: systemic review,” BMJ, March 2012. Harvard School of Public Health researchers apparently examined four articles with “seven distinct prospective cohort analyses in Asian and Western populations” that included a total of 13,284 incident cases of type 2 diabetes among 352,384 participants. The results purportedly suggested that the correlation “seems to be stronger for Asians than for Western populations,” with each serving per day of white rice “associated with an 11% increase in risk of diabetes in the overall population.” The authors also speculated on potential mechanisms to explain the association, especially among Asian populations where “white rice is consumed as a staple food” and “is the predominant contributor to dietary glycaemic load.” As…
“The ‘calorie is a calorie’ argument is widely used by the processed food industry to explain that weight loss isn’t really about what you eat but about how many calories you eat,” writes New York Times columnist Mark Bittman in a March 20, 2012, “Opinionator” post about Marion Nestle and Malden Nesheim’s new book, Why Calories Count: From Science to Politics (University of California Press 2012). Initially interested in how calories are processed by the human body, Bittman concludes after interviewing Nestle that “the situation is not so simple,” with many factors beside calorie intake determining how metabolism regulates weight. “It’s hard to lose weight, because the body is set up to defend fat, so you don’t starve to death;” explains Nestle, “the body doesn’t work as well to tell people to stop eating as when to tell them when to start.” Nestle suggests that more is needed to reduce…
The U.K.-based Chemicals, Health and Environment Monitoring (CHEM) Trust has issued a March 2012 report claiming that recent studies have linked “hormone disrupting chemicals in food and consumer products” to obesity and Type 2 diabetes in humans. The report apparently analyzes 240 research papers offering epidemiological or laboratory evidence to suggest that certain chemicals—such as persistent organic pollutants (POPs), bisphenol A (BPA) and phthalates—are obesogenic or diabetogenic. “The chemicals implicated include some to which the general population are typically exposed on a daily basis,” states the report, which also speculates that some “endocrine disrupting chemicals” (EDCs) stored in body fat “may play a role in the causal relationship between obesity and diabetes.” Based on its findings, CHEM Trust argues that obesity prevention strategies like dietary interventions “should not obscure the need for government policies within and outside the health sector” to reduce chemical exposure through the food chain, food containers…
A recent opinion piece published in Nature Reviews Neuroscience has questioned efforts to conceptualize obesity and overeating “as a food addiction accompanied by corresponding brain changes,” in the process raising concerns about the rush to adopt this model as a foundation for clinical and policy recommendations. Hisham Ziauddeen, et al., “Obesity and the brain: how convincing is the addiction model?,” Nature Reviews Neuroscience, April 2012. From the outset, the article distinguishes between two popular views of food addiction, one of which posits that certain foods are addictive and one of which attempts to define food addiction as a “behavioral phenotype” seen in some people with obesity that “resembles drug addiction.” In light of these differing perspectives, the article reviews the “five key pieces of evidence cited in support of addiction model,” that is, (i) “a clinical overlap between obesity (or, more specifically BED [binge-eating disorder]) and drug addiction”; (ii) “evidence of…
Del Monte Fresh Produce has reportedly informed Oregon Public Health and state Senior Epidemiologist William Keene that it will not act on its notice to sue over their identification of the company’s imported cantaloupes as the source of a 2011 Salmonella outbreak. Additional details about the litigation threat appear in Issue 408 of this Update. While a spokesperson refused to comment on the company’s action, its letter apparently indicated that the withdrawal was “a show of good faith” in its food safety discussions with the state; it is seeking a meeting with state food safety scientists. Del Monte Fresh Produce also sued the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), claiming that the agency lacked an adequate factual basis to conclude that the company’s Guatemalan cantaloupe supplier was the source of the contamination. The company sought to lift FDA’s import alert which prohibited it from importing from its Guatemalan source without proving the…
Two California men who allegedly worked as cooks at a Riverside County Olive Garden have filed a putative class action as private attorneys general under the California Labor Code, claiming that they performed off-the-clock work, were not provided meal or rest breaks as required by law or paid overtime, and had the cost of shoes deducted from their paychecks. Romo v. GMRI, Inc., No. RIC1203891 (Cal. Super. Ct., Riverside Cty., filed March 19, 2012). They also claim that their employer failed to pay them promptly as required by law when they left their jobs. They seek to represent all non-exempt or hourly paid Olive Garden employees in the state. According to the complaint, the off-the-clock and overtime work the plaintiffs performed was necessitated due to the volume of work and frequent understaffing. Claiming unpaid overtime, unpaid minimum wages, non-compliant wage statements, unlawful deductions, and wages not timely paid upon termination,…
A company that insured Basic Food Flavors Inc. has asked a court to approve its settlement in a coverage dispute concerning a 2010 Salmonella outbreak involving hydrolyzed vegetable protein, a flavorings ingredient used in processed foods. Employers Fire Ins. Co. v. Basic Food Flavors Inc., 10-1109 (D. Nev., motion to approve settlement filed March 21, 2012). The ensuing recall apparently affected more than 100 of Basic Food’s customers, in addition to downstream suppliers, distributors and retailers. Under the agreement, the insurance company agreed to pay its coverage limits of $11 million. According to a news source, a neutral administrator has approved more than $34 million in claims against Basic Food. See Law 360, March 22, 2012.
