A recent National Research Council (NRC) report has apparently found no scientific evidence to support “more stringent testing of meat purchased through the government’s ground beef purchase program,” which distributes products to the National School Lunch Program and other public outlets. According to a December 9, 2010, National Academies press release, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS) purchases ground beef from suppliers “who must meet mandatory process, quality, traceback, and handling controls as well as comply with strict limitations on the amounts of bacteria in the meat, such as E. coli and salmonella.” To assess this program, the National Academies established a committee to review the scientific basis of AMS’s ground beef safety standards, evaluate how these standards compare to those used by large retail and commercial purchasers, and recommend possible improvements to the federal system. The committee evidently found that AMS’s “scientific basis for the current…
The U.S. Department of Commerce’s Internet Policy Task Force (IPTF) has issued a green paper titled Commercial Data Privacy and Innovation in the Internet Economy: A Dynamic Policy Framework, which sets forth initial policy recommendations for “promoting consumer privacy online while ensuring the Internet remains a platform that spurs innovation, job creation, and economic growth.” To this end, the report “reviews the technological, legal, and policy contexts of current commercial data privacy challenges; describes the importance of developing a more dynamic approach to commercial privacy both in the United States and around the world; and discusses policy options (and poses additional questions) to meet today’s privacy challenges in ways that enable continued innovation.” Designed to promote “privacy, transparency and informed choice,” the IPTF framework reflects input from stakeholders in industry, academia and government. It specifically calls for (i) “establishing Fair Information Practice Principles comparable to a ‘Privacy Bill of Rights’ for…
President Barack Obama (D) has signed the Healthy, Hungry-Free Kids Act of 2010 into law, calling the bipartisan legislation “vitally important to the health and welfare of our kids and to our country.” Details about the bill appear in Issue 374 of this Update. “We’re seeing this problem in every part of our country in kids from all different backgrounds and all walks of life,” the president said in a statement. “As a result, doctors are now starting to see conditions like high blood pressure, high cholesterol and Type II diabetes in children—these are things that they only used to see in adults. And this bill is about reversing that trend and giving our kids the healthy futures that they deserve.” See White House Press Release, December 13, 2010.
A literature review and meta-analysis of global studies published since 1980 has reportedly found a “weak association” between parents’ dietary intake and that of their children, suggesting to lead author Youfa Wang that “family environment plays only a partial role” in people’s eating patterns. Youfa Wang, et al., “Do children and their parents eat a similar diet? Resemblance in child and parental dietary intake: systematic review and meta-analysis,” Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, November 2010. According to a December 8, 2010, press release, researchers with the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, National Institute of Aging and University of Zaragoza compared “parent-child pairs’ dietary intakes, by type of parent-child pairs (for example, mother-daughter vs. father-son), world regions and dietary assessment methods, and over time.” Their findings apparently indicated “differences in parent-child dietary intake resemblance, across nutrients and dietary assessment approaches,” with parent-child correlations for energy and total fat intakes…
“Essentially, we have a system where wealthy farmers feed the poor crap and poor farmers feed the wealthy high-quality food,” food activist Michael Pollan told Newsweek society editor Lisa Miller in this article examining the gap in the availability of nutritious, fresh and organic foods between rich and lower-income Americans. Noting that “in hard times, food has always marked a bright border between the haves and the have-nots,” Miller opines that healthier foods “have become luxury goods that only some can afford” while “highly caloric, mass-produced foods like pizza and packaged cakes” are staples for the poorest Americans, many of whom are obese and live in “food deserts” that lack supermarkets stocked with nutritious fare. “Corpulence used to signify the prosperity of a few but has now become a marker of poverty,” Miller writes. She quotes recent statistics from the U.S. Department of Agriculture that show 17 percent of Americans…
Yale University’s Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity has released a new international database designed to track company pledges to limit food marketing to children. The database currently features 16 pledges: (i) three specific to the soft-drink industry; (ii) one specific to the food industry; and (iii) 12 applicable to the entire food industry. The pledges covered to date include the Council for Better Business Bureaus’ Children’s Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative (CFBAI), as well as agreements that are either international in scope or based in Australia, Brazil, Canada, European Union, India, Mexico, Russia, South Africa, or Thailand. The site breaks down each pledge according to “key criteria that define specific restrictions on marketing communications to children, including the definition of ‘children’ (age), the marketing directed at them (audience definition), the communications channels (ex. television, internet, etc.), marketing methods (ex. advertising using licensed characters, advertising using promotional materials, etc.)…
Since the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) acted last month to nix alcoholic energy drinks, media focus has apparently shifted to the new campus craze, alcohol-infused whipped creams sold under the monikers CREAM and Whipped Lightning. The growing popularity of “whipahol®” has drawn scrutiny from both public health officials and campus administrators, who in some cases have warned parents about “creative combinations of alcohol” and raised questions about the sufficiency of package labeling. As one Boston Public Health Commission spokesperson told reporters, “If a product looks like something else, it’s easy not to be aware that it might contain a lot of alcohol.” See The Boston Herald, November 28, 2010; Boston NECN, November 29, 2010; University of Kansas Parent Association ENews, December 2010. According to various news sources, the 30-proof canisters are sold in liquor stores where they do not need to be refrigerated and have a shelf life approaching nine months. Moreover,…
Hershey Company has reportedly sued Mars for trademark infringement in a Pennsylvania federal court, alleging that colors used in the packaging for Mars’s Dove peanut-butter milk-chocolate Promises® candy is too similar to what Hershey uses for its Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups®. Mars apparently filed a preemptive suit just days earlier in a Virginia federal court, asking to dismiss the Hershey complaint. Mars reportedly contends that Hershey admits it does not have exclusive rights to package peanut-butter candies in orange wrappers and that orange is commonly used in the industry as an indicator of peanut-butter flavor. According to a news source, Hershey sent a cease-and desist letter to Mars in November 2010, stating, “It can come as no surprise to Mars that Hershey, having objected to the color of the individual Dove peanut butter chocolate wrappers and filed a counterclaim to obtain a change of that color, would have a serious problem…
Two Missouri residents with arthritis and allergies have filed a putative class action on behalf of Missouri, Illinois and Kansas consumers who were allegedly deceived by false health-related claims made by a company that sells elderberry juice. Delling v. Wyldewood Cellars, Inc., No. 10-02287 (E.D. Mo., filed December 6, 2010). The complaint also names a retailer as a defendant. The plaintiffs contend that they read an advertisement stating that elderberry juice “prevents colds, flu, viruses, asthma, allergies, diabetes, arthritis & more!” When they went to the store to further evaluate the product, they allegedly read customer and “physician” testimonials about the curative properties of elderberry juice and decided to purchase the product. According to the plaintiffs, they used the product “but failed to realize any health benefits and certainly did not see any abatement in their allergy or arthritis problems.” The plaintiffs allege one count of consumer fraud and seek…
Alleging that Perdue Farms Inc. misleads consumers by labeling its chicken products as “Humanely Raised,” a member of the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) has reportedly filed a putative class action against the company in a New Jersey court. The suit apparently claims that the company’s chickens are processed under National Chicken Council guidelines that allow “numerous inhumane practices, including painful handling and shackling of live birds . . . and egregiously inhumane slaughter practices.” The plaintiff seeks to represent all consumers who buy the company’s chicken products relying on the “alleged deceptive and misleading humane claim.” Compensatory damages and injunction relief are also sought. According to an HSUS spokesperson, “Rather than implementing humane reforms, Perdue has simply slapped ‘humanely raised’ stickers on its factory farmed products, hoping consumers won’t know the difference.” Perdue reportedly responded to the complaint by stating, “The Humane Society of the United States…
