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ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross has been a busy man. Yesterday he presented ACSH’s position paper on the mentholation of cigarettes to an FDA panel considering a ban on the products. He also had an op-ed in Forbes.com on how the U.S.

ACSH staffers were troubled — again — by a Los Angeles Times article covering a new study published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives that claims children born to mothers who live “near freeways” have twice the risk of autism. The association only held between autism and freeways — not major roads.

If enacted, a new proposed policy by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) would restrict where and how genetically modified (GM) crops may be grown. This would be a significant and troubling shift for the agency. The USDA appears to be responding to protests from anti-biotech activists and organic farmers.

Just 24 hours after New York Times editors launched their attack on Happy Meals as irresponsible corporate activity, the paper’s Science section printed an article implicitly endorsing a range of ideas which can best be described as based on magical thinking. The article depicts the travails of radiologist and breast cancer specialist Dr. Marisa Weiss. Some years ago, Dr.

Josh Bloom, National Review Online 12/21/10
New Antibiotics, Stat!

Two opinions set forward in the last few days by Consumer Reports magazine suggest that, as ACSH's Dr. Elizabeth Whelan puts it, they should stick to testing cars.

The last few days have also seen the announcement of two major breakthroughs with regard to the identification and prevention of infectious diseases with major impact in the third world, especially Africa. We refer to a new, low-cost meningitis vaccine being made available in the developing world, and approval of a new and better test for tuberculosis (TB).

Might there be a relationship between Alzheimer’s disease and levels within the body of the good cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein (HDL)?Today’s edition of the Archives of Neurology includes a study performed at Columbia Univers

Five years ago, environmental activist Erin Brockovich was awarded the Harvard School of Public Health’s Julius B. Richmond Award — their highest honor for the promotion of public health — for her legal efforts to expose the undisclosed leaking of chromium (VI) (hexavalent chromium) by Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) into the water supply of the California desert town of Hinkley. Allegedly, this was the cause of a spike in cancer cases among the town’s residents.

Many people may find it surprising to learn that China s 300 million smokers consume a third of the world s cigarettes. But then 60 percent of Chinese men smoke an average of 15 cigarettes per day. The result, according to the International Union Against Tuberculosis and Lung disease, is that smoking-related diseases cause one million Chinese deaths each year, and this number is projected to double by the 2020.

Based on phase III data from a recent study, the FDA has expanded the indication for Actemra, the rheumatoid arthritis (RA) drug tocilizumab. The Actemra label now includes inhibition and slowing of structural joint damage and improvement of physical function in adult patients with moderately to severely active RA, when given in combination with methotrexate.
RA is a debilitating disease afflicting almost two million Americans.

A new study lessens concerns that radiation exposure from diagnostic CT scans — a medical procedure that has become more common in the past decade — has substantially increased cancer incidence.

ACSH would like to induct a recent study seeking to link increased red meat consumption to a higher risk of stroke in women into our very own Data Dredging Hall of Fame/Shame. In an analysis of 34,670 Swedish women between the ages of 39 and 73, researchers found that those in the top tenth for red meat consumption — eating about 3.6 ounces daily — had a 42 percent higher chance of suffering from an ischemic stroke (from a blocked artery) than women who ate just under an ounce of red meat daily.

A study released on Thursday in Menopause: The Journal of the North American Menopause Society revealed that most women taking hormone replacement therapy (HRT) are still receiving high dose treatments of the female hormones estrogen plus progesterone.

A story in yesterday’s Health Day News points out a worrisome trend: increasing rates of head and neck cancer among the middle-aged and even among the young. The article notes that researchers believe this is a direct result of the more common practice of oral sex in the U.S. Through oral sex, the human papillomavirus (HPV), which can cause these cancers, is transmitted from the genitals to the mouth and larynx.

Due to inclement weather in New York City, ACSH was closed yesterday and was unable to distribute our daily Dispatch. We’re happy to be back on the anti-junk science crusade today with this lineup of great stories.

As ACSH is preparing to release its new publication Scared to Death: How Chemophobia Threatens Public Health, we were not so surprised to read about three new stories linking chemicals to a multitude of adverse health effects — which is what sadly seems to be a media-fueled national trend these days.

The incidence of age-related macular degeneration (AMD), the leading cause of vision loss in people over the age of 50 — a result of damage to the center of the retina — has decreased in the last 15 years. A new study published in the Archives of Ophthalmology used data from the 2005 to 2008 NHANES database and looked at high-resolution pictures of the eyes of 5,533 U.S. adults over the age of 40.

Acetaminophen, the key ingredient used in over-the-counter (OTC) drugs like Tylenol and Nyquil, will be limited to only 325 milligrams per dose in prescription painkillers such as Vicodin and Percocet, the FDA announced yesterday.

Hoover Institute Fellow and former ACSH trustee Dr. Henry Miller castigates Surgeon General Dr. Regina Benjamin’s single-minded focus on obesity while ignoring other very important health issues. Instead, Dr. Miller presents former Surgeon General and ACSH friend Dr. C. Everett Koop — who led campaigns to increase awareness of HIV and smoking-related health risks — as a better example to follow. Dr. Miller also recommends that Dr.

Only a century ago, Americans could expect to lose most of their teeth by age 40. But, since fluoridation of tap water was introduced in the mid-twentieth century, the incidence of tooth decay has nosedived. Now, however, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the EPA have announced that they want to reduce the maximum allowable fluoride levels in municipal water supplies as recent data showed that more than one in three U.S.

The CDC gives us some good news, but it is a silver cloud with a black lining — road fatalities have experienced the largest reduction since World War II thanks in part to the poor economy. According to the report, U.S. road deaths dropped by 22 percent from from 43,510 to 33,963 between 2005 and 2009. The authors attribute this to “technological advances, primarily air bags, and the economic downturn.” The weak economy, they suggest, has reduced highway and rush hour traffic as local road traffic increased.

Yesterday also saw the release of another “study” by the influential radical advocacy organization Environmental Working Group (EWG). EWG studied the origins, precise chemical contents and the labels of 173 brands of bottled water and then rated them. But what was the purpose of this? All of the water bottles contained...well, water. Some brands were somewhat more purified than others, and a few included flavorings of various sorts.

Last week brought word of a study which claimed that the anti-depressant drug known by the trade name Lexapro (escitalopram) could reduce the incidence of hot flashes among menopausal women. Dr. Ross notes that the study offered less than the headlines suggested. In fact, a placebo did not do all that much worse than the anti-depressant.

The “Green” movement has set its sights on a new consumer market: green pharmaceuticals. Slate reports that hysteria about the effect of consumers flushing pills down the toilet — including hypothetical claims that intersex minnows found in water were contaminated by pharmaceuticals — has prompted some environmentalists to suggest that manufacturers should reformulate popular drugs to render them more biodegradable. “This is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard,” says ACSH’s Dr. Josh Bloom.