A Denver man, Wayne Watson, is suing the grocery store where he bought microwave popcorn which he ate daily -- about two bags per day. The popcorn was flavored with diacetyl -- naturally found in butter and some other dairy products. Diacetyl, when inhaled in large amounts, is thought to be responsible for a rare lung disease -- bronchilitis obliterans. It has been diagnosed at unusually high rates in workers in a factory that produced the butter-flavored snack.
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This week's announcement by Philip Morris that it plans a "global blitz" to dramatically increase the number of cigarette smokers around the world represents the ultimate public health nightmare.
Turns out the truth doesn't matter. The New York City Health Department is standing by TV ads that show children allegedly sickened by exposure to second hand smoke. Only problem is, the deathly-ill kids weren't actually known to be exposed to smoke. They were just stock footage of diseased kids.
But the kids in the pictures have the same diseases caused by second-hand smoke, so that's good enough for the Health Department.
It wouldn't be good enough, though, for the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) according to the president of the American Academy of Advertising.
An article featured in the Wall Street Journal this week may have left many people asking: What's more important, my heart or my brain?
A February piece by the Heartland Institute's Melissa Mercer on New York City's calorie-count mandate for restaurants notes the skepticism of ACSH's Dr. Ruth Kava:
If approved, the ordinance would affect only 10% of the city's 23,000 restaurants, according to a statement issued by the Department of Health.
"It [seems] unfair -- there are many other restaurants that won't be touched by this regulation," said Ruth Kava, director of nutrition at the Manhattan-based American Council on Science and Health...
We've gotten some encouraging responses to the ACSH report on Scrutinizing Industry-Funded Science:
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We seem to agree on the major issues.
Finally, looks like saccharin will not only cause cancer (according to high-dose rat studies), it also will make us obese. A study published in the journal Behavioral Neuroscience found that the calorie-free artificial sweeteners drove rats to overeat by breaking the physiological connection between sweet tastes and calories.
MORNING DISPATCH 9/12/08: McDonald's, FDA, Botox, Helmets, Drinking Water, and Religious Diets
Once again, we’re told, the pharmaceutical industry is trying to pull the wool over the eyes of Americans. This time the deceit is ghost writing, the practice by which someone other than the named author writes a clinical trial or scientific review article. The purported scandal is that ghost writing activities are supported financially by industry. As an April 15 Washington Post headline proclaimed, "Key Vioxx Research Was Written by Merck, Documents Allege."
In the years since the 1999 Koop report on DEHP and DINP -- and the NTP-CERHR evaluations of seven phthalate esters conducted from 1998-2000 -- there have been a large number of new studies on possible toxic effects of phthalates. Many of these have been incorporated into the deliberations of expert panels, including those representing a variety of European Commission scientific agencies. The latest of these, focused on DEHP, appeared in early 2008.
Today is being commemorated around the globe as "World Malaria Day." Note, I didn't say "celebrated" -- clearly an inappropriate descriptor for a disease which, despite the availability of effective preventive measures, continues to kill over one-million impoverished people (mostly young children) annually. The toll of those sickened, both from health and economic perspectives, is incalculable but enormous.
What started out as a great idea -- replacing our dependence on oil with a renewable clean-burning resource, biofuel -- has quickly sprouted unintended consequences. We are diverting our perfectly good growing land to produce crops used exclusively for biofuel production. We have essentially decided to burn our food supply in attempts to replace our oil fix. This seems about as logical as burning money for heat. We are desperately in need of energy-junkie rehab.
"[B]ee stings, suburn, boating accidents and an increased risk of food poisoning can all subtract from the fun."
For many years milk marketers have provided consumers with a plethora of choices -- regular, reduced fat, low fat, nonfat, lactose-reduced, etc., etc. All such products have something real to offer. Unfortunately, for the past few years many have decided to add labeling that their milk comes from cows that "were not treated with rBST" (recombinant bovine somatotropin).
Using the untimely death of former White House press secretary Tony Snow from colon cancer as an example, the animal rights activists misleadingly called the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) imply that such a fate awaits children who are fed hot dogs as part of school lunches.
In an egregious attempt to frighten parents, PCRM today warned that allowing children to eat processed meats such as hot dogs or baloney would set them up for cancer later in life.
Shortly after Merck's HPV vaccine Gardasil was made available in the U.S. in 2006, Texas and Virginia decided to make the shots mandatory for all girls entering the sixth grade. The requirement didn't last long in either state -- the Texas legislature voted to overturn the executive order mandating the vaccine, while Virginia provided broad "opt-out" provisions for parents. But the debate rages on: should Gardasil be mandatory?
This letter was published on May 21, 2009 by the Cleveland Plain Dealer:
This piece first appeared in Pharmacology Matters, the newsletter of the British Pharmacological Society, Vol 2(1); 9-11, April, 2009:
New York, NY -- March 13, 2009. Scientists and physicians at the American Council on Science and Health (ACSH) call for the reform of a broken regulatory system -- one that now tries to appease advocates of junk science who pressure the Food and Drug Administration.
The documentary Food, Inc., which argues the evils of big corporations behind America s food industry, hits the box office on Friday. So far, interviews with the creative minds behind the film have failed to impress ACSH staffers. When folks who make movies like this are interviewed about factory farming, animal supplements, and [the protein hormone] rBST, I can safely predict that they will be full of misinformation, says ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross.
The newest likely victim of the travesty that is the proposed FDA tobacco regulation bill is a dissolvable nicotine-delivery system developed by R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company that could be a valuable cessation device. The product s detractors, such as Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown, are calling it tobacco candy that is marketed to children: For years, tobacco companies have deceived consumers and marketed products to children continually trying to replace the 400,000 customers they lose each year to tobacco-related deaths and illnesses.
In an effort to defend itself against the prevailing opinion that its food is unhealthy, McDonald's began inviting mothers from across the country to get an inside look at how its food is made. Touring everything from a bun factory to the kitchen of a McDonald's restaurant, the moms saw that fast food is, indeed, real food.
Many pharmaceutical companies continue to research obesity drugs, despite recent issues regarding side effects and halted experiments. "There's a lot of good research in this area going on behind closed doors, but it's not going to show its face for years," ACSH's Dr. Gilbert Ross says.
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