Tag: children
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Food Logo Familiarity Linked to Childhood Obesity?
A new study has reportedly concluded that “the more a child is familiar with logos and other images from fast-food restaurants, sodas and not-so-healthy snack food brands, the more likely a child is to be overweight or obese.” T. Bettina Cornwell, “Children’s knowledge of packaged and fast food brands and their BMI: Why the relationship…
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EFSA Calls Acrylamide “A Public Health Concern”
The European Food Safety Authority’s (EFSA’s) Panel on Contaminants in the Food Chain (CONTAM Panel) has published a draft scientific opinion on acrylamide (AA) in food that urges the further reduction of dietary exposure to the substance. According to the draft opinion, AA is formed when the sugars and amino acids in carbohydrate-rich foods—such as…
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CSPI Asks FDA to Require Energy Drink Warning Labels
The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) has submitted a letter to U.S Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Margaret Hamburg requesting that FDA require that “all beverages consumed in a soda-like manner, including energy drinks, comply with the same regulations that limit caffeine in ‘cola-type beverages’” and that energy drinks carry warning…
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EWG Claims Excessive Fortification Poses Health Risk to Kids
The Environmental Working Group (EWG) has released a June 2014 report claiming that the fortification of foods with large amounts of vitamins and minerals could pose a health risk to children. Citing a study by the National Institutes of Health and California Polytechnic State University, EWG alleges that children younger than age 8 “are at…
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Consumer Goods Forum Pledges Changes in Food Advertising to Children and Nutrition Labeling
A consortium of more than 400 food manufacturers and retailers, the Consumer Goods Forum, has built on a 2011 pledge to clarify nutrition labeling and to advertise only those products fulfilling specific nutritional criteria to children younger than 12. The new pledge further defined the goals by setting deadlines; both reforms are to be completed…
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New Report Claims Industry and Government Promote “Dairy Junk Foods”
Public Health attorney and author Michele Simon has issued a report titled “Whitewashed: How Industry and Government Promote Dairy Junk Foods.” According to Simon, dairy foods have gotten “a pass” as the public health community focuses on “obvious culprits such as soft drinks and fast food” to address the nation’s “public health epidemic due to…
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SSB Playbook Calls for Multi-Pronged Public Health Approach
During the second National Soda Summit held in Washington, D.C., in early June 2014, ChangeLab Solutions, which has been active in tobacco control, presented a “Sugar-Sweetened Beverages [SSB] Playbook” calling for a public information campaign that would include telling consumers “you’re drinking 16 packs of sugar in that cola.” Other “playbook strategies” include a progression of…
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Rudd Center Faults CFBAI in Report on TV Food Advertising to Young People
The Yale Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity has released a new brief updating its annual report on trends in TV food advertising to young people. Documenting changes “in the total number of food-related TV ads viewed by children and adolescents from 2002 to 2013,” the brief concludes that despite the Children’s Food and…