Category: Other Developments
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Nanomaterial Concerns Prompt Dunkin’ to Remove Titanium Dioxide from Powdered Donuts
Responding to a shareholder resolution filed by As You Sow, Dunkin’ Brands Group Inc. has reportedly agreed to reformulate its white powdered donuts to avoid the use of titanium dioxide nanoparticles. In return, the shareholder advocacy group has withdrawn its most recent resolution, which claimed that “recent research on the ingestion of inorganic nanoparticles has…
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Lancet Publishes Six-Part Series on “Rethinking and Reframing” Obesity
A series of six articles published online February 18, 2015, by The Lancet reportedly “examines false dichotomies and proposes a reframing of obesity as a consequence of the ‘reciprocal nature of the interaction between the environment and the individual,’ where feedback loops perpetuate food choices and behaviors.” “Our understanding of obesity must be completely reframed…
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IOM Workshop to Explore Role of Chemical Exposures in Development of Obesity
The Institute of Medicine’s (IOM’s) Roundtable on Environmental Health Sciences, Research, and Medicine is hosting a March 2-3, 2015, workshop in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, to discuss the “interplay between environmental exposures and obesity.” Topics of discussion will include the alleged links “between exposure to environmental chemicals and increased incidence of weight gain, glucose…
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RWJF Doubles Financial Commitment to Expand Programs Aimed at Reducing Childhood Obesity, Issues Priorities for Next Decade
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) will reportedly commit $500 million over the next 10 years to intensified efforts ensuring that “all children in the United States—no matter who they are or where they live—can grow up at a healthy weight.” According to a February 5, 2015, news release, the health philanthropy’s new initiatives will…
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New Nonprofit Watchdog Aims to “Expose What the Food Industry Doesn’t Want Us to Know”
U.S. Right to Know (USRTK), an Oakland, California-based nonprofit, launched in late January 2015 under the leadership of Gary Ruskin, former executive director of Commercial Alert. The group claims to be “working to expose what the food industry doesn’t want us to know. We do research and communications on the failures of the corporate food…
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UK Group to Host Symposium Targeting Potential Impact of POPs on Obesity
The Committee on Toxicity of Chemicals in Food, Consumer Products and the Environment (COT), an independent group charged with providing counsel to various UK government agencies, is holding a March 18, 2015, symposium in Birmingham about the possible role of exposure to persistent organic pollutants (POPs) on the development of obesity. The robust agenda will…
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French Court Forbids “Nutella” Baby Name
A French court has reportedly rejected a couple’s choice of name for their baby, “Nutella,” and renamed her “Ella” because “the name ‘Nutella’ given to the child is the trade name of a spread” and “it is contrary to the child’s interest to be wearing a name like that” because it “can only lead to…
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Consumer Reports Touts Mandatory GMO Labeling
Citing increased demand for food and beverage products that do not contain genetically modified organisms (GMOs) as ingredients, the March 2015 issue of Consumer Reports magazine features an article intended to help consumers “sift through the facts” about the purported health and environmental effects of GMOs. The column describes recent attempts by individual states to…