The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has announced a settlement with Nestlé HealthCare Nutrition, Inc., which the agency contends has deceptively marketed a children’s drink, BOOST Kid Essentials®, as a product clinically shown to reduce illness in children by strengthening the immune system and helping them recover more quickly from diarrhea. The beverage, intended for children ages 1 to 13, contains probiotics embedded in a straw that was “prominently featured in ads for the product.” According to the FTC, the company has agreed to stop making health-related claims about cold or flu viruses “unless the claim is approved by the Food and Drug Administration.” The company has also agreed to cease making claims about diarrhea and reduced absences from day care or school “unless the representation is non-misleading and, at the time of making such representation, the [company] possesses and relies upon competent and reliable scientific evidence that substantiates that the…
U.S. Representative Edward Markey (D-Mass.) has called on the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to respond to reports that the April 20, 2010, oil spill has contaminated the marine food chain in the Gulf of Mexico with toxins such as arsenic. In a July 13 letter to FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, Markey expressed concern “that the mixture of oil, dispersants, arsenic and other toxic compounds are having effects on seafood that may not be detectable for months.” Markey, chair of the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, said researchers have uncovered droplets of oil found inside crab larvae harvested from gulf waters near Pensacola, Florida; Galveston, Texas; and Grand Isle, Louisiana. “In some areas, 100 percent of the larvae recovered contain droplets of oil hydrocarbons, a major concern given that crab is a favorite food for both humans and multiple fish species that live in the marshes,”…
U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) has asked the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to investigate the marketing of certain caffeinated malt beverages that “seem to be explicitly designed to attract underage drinkers” and to determine whether new enforcement actions are warranted. In a July 12, 2010, press release, Schumer singled out popular drinks “that appear hip with flashy colors and funky designs” but contain 12 percent alcohol, which is more than twice the amount in a bottle of beer or glass of wine. “However, the labeling and packaging of these beverages renders them nearly indistinguishable from ordinary energy drinks,” Schumer said. “Some stores even stock them directly next to other energy drinks causing further confusion for legal and illegal consumers.” Schumer called the marketing “extremely troubling” in a letter to FTC Chair Jon Leibowitz. “Frankly, it looks to me as if manufacturers are trying to mislead adults and business owners who…
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has issued a report that claims less than 10 percent of American adults limit their daily sodium intake to recommended levels. Titled “Sodium Intake Among Adults—United States, 2005-2006,” the report also suggests that processed grains and meats, including poultry and luncheon meats, provide two-thirds of sodium in the U.S. diet. In addition, approximately 77 percent of dietary sodium purportedly comes from processed and restaurant foods, many of which do not taste salty. U.S. adults consume more than twice the current recommended limit of 2,300 milligrams of sodium per day, according to the report, which examined data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey. “Sodium has become so pervasive in our food supply that it’s difficult for the vast majority of Americans to stay within recommended limits,” said lead author Janelle Peralez Gunn. “Public health professionals, together with food manufacturers, retailers and health care…
This article calls for government authorities to treat “junk food” and the obesity epidemic exactly as they addressed smoking. Noting that the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s latest dietary guidelines have recycled the same advice given 30 years ago, while the rate of obese Americans has roughly doubled in that time, columnist Davis Lazarus calls for “draconian” measures to reduce consumption of high-fat, high-salt, high-sugar products. Among other matters, he contends that such an aggressive campaign could mean anything from making certain foods less appealing by removing them from schools, government buildings and workplaces, to taxing sweetened beverages, stepping up wellness programs and subsidizing healthy foods instead of corn.
“The Food and Drug Administration [FDA] is seriously considering whether to approve the first genetically engineered [GE] animal that people would eat—salmon that can grow at twice the normal rate,” reports New York Times biotechnology correspondent Andrew Pollack in this article about the decade-long regulatory process. Pollack identifies the petitioner as a Waltham, Massachusetts, company named AquaBounty Technologies, which has now submitted “most or all of the data the [FDA] needs to analyze whether the salmon are safe to eat, nutritionally equivalent to other salmon and safe for the environment.” The fish under review is an Atlantic salmon that contains “a growth hormone gene from Chinook salmon as well as a genetic on-switch from ocean pout.” As AquaBounty Chief Executive Ronald Stotish explained to Pollack, the accelerated maturation would not result in “salmon the size of the Hindenburg,” but would help bring fish to market in one half the usual…
A new report has claimed that adult obesity in the United States has increased in 28 states in the past year and that 38 states have adult obesity rates above 25 percent. Titled “F as in Fat: How Obesity Threatens America’s Future 2010,” the report from Trust for America’s Health (TFAH) and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation “highlights troubling racial, ethnic, regional and income disparities in the nation’s obesity epidemic.” “This report shows that the country has taken bold steps to address the obesity crisis in recent years, but the nation’s response has yet to fully match the magnitude of the problem,” TFAH Executive Director Jeffrey Levi was quoted as saying. “Millions of Americans still face barrier like the high cost of healthy foods and lack of access to safe places to be physically active—that make healthy choices challenging.” The report’s key policy recommendations include (i) support for obesity- and…
Following Kellogg Co.’s voluntary recall of some 28 million boxes of breakfast cereals for a “waxy” smell and flavor emitted from package liners, some have pointed to growing public concern over chemicals, such as bisphenol A, that are allegedly leaching into foods from packaging materials. The Kellogg recall involved an unknown substance added to the liners at the company’s Omaha, Nebraska, facility; it reportedly gave rise to complaints about nausea and vomiting, and the company warned parents that it could cause vomiting or diarrhea in sensitive children. Writing about the recall, The Daily Green discusses a 2009 study of legal food packaging substances that purportedly have endocrine disrupting properties. Among the food packaging chemicals with potential health effects are lead in glass, ortho-phenylphenol in beer and soda cans, perfluorinated compounds in paper packaging, and benzophenone in milk, juice and wine cartons. See The Associated Press, June 25, 2010; The Daily Green,…
The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) has issued a report urging the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to ban several food dyes that allegedly pose “risks of cancer, hyperactivity in children, and allergies.” According to a June 29, 2010, CSPI press release, “Dyed foods should be considered adulterated under the law, because the dyes make a food ‘appear better or of greater value that it is’—typically by masking the absence of fruit, vegetable, or other more costly ingredient.” CSPI has charged FDA with failing to enforce “a stricter standard of safety for color additives than other food additives,” despite a five-fold increase in per capita consumption of dyes since 1955. It has specifically asked the agency to prohibit (i) Red 3 and Citrus Red 2 “because they caused cancer in rats,” (ii) Red 40, Yellow 5 and Yellow 6, “which are tainted with cancer-causing contaminants,” including benzidine and…
The National Research Council (NRC) recently issued a report titled Toward Sustainable Agricultural Systems in the 21st Century, which reviews farming practices, technologies and management systems that seek to promote environmental, social and economic sustainability. According to NRC, “the scale, organization, enterprise diversity, and forms of market integration associated with individual farms provide unique opportunities or barriers to improving their ability to contribute to global or local food production, ecosystem integrity, economic viability, and social well-being.” The report apparently evaluates agricultural systems on whether they are sufficiently productive, robust and efficient in their efforts to meet these four goals. It also proposes “two parallel and overlapping efforts to ensure continuous improvement in the sustainability performance of U.S. agriculture: incremental and transformative.” The former approach “would be directed at improving the sustainability of all farms, irrespective of size or farming system type,” while the latter “would apply a systems perspective to…
