Health News - Thursday, February 22, 2007
The Coca-Cola Company said Wednesday that it would put caffeine content information on the labels of all of its drink products distributed in the United States that include the ingredient. The company said the plan was voluntary and part of an industry initiative.
On Monday in New York, Simcha Felder, a Democratic city councilman from Brooklyn, said he intended to introduce a nonbinding Council resolution calling for the Food and Drug Administration to require that caffeine content be included in product labels on food and beverages. The F.D.A. requires that caffeine be included in ingredient lists when added to soft drinks and caffeinated water, but has not required that caffeine content be labeled, even though it has long advised pregnant women to avoid or limit their intake of caffeine. Continue reading
Ozonolysis purifiers emit ozone at higher levels with the goal of oxidizing volatile organic compounds in the air, but that consequently can cause health problems as well, U.S. researchers said Wednesday.
High levels of airborne particles can aggravate asthma and cardiovascular problems, and have been linked to high death and lung cancer rates, said the researchers at the University of California in Irvine (UCI). Excess ozone can damage the lungs, causing chest pain, coughing, shortness of breath and throat irritation, according to the researchers. They claimed that cleaning products containing chemicals that produce a lemon smell can dirty the air when used with indoor air purifiers that produce even a small amount of ozone. Continue reading
Watching television disrupts children's' normal response to food -- they will eat more while they're sitting in front of the tube, whether or not they're really hungry. "These data, combined with those from other studies, support recommendations to reduce television watching and restrict eating while watching television as part of a healthy lifestyle," Dr. Jennifer L. Temple and colleagues from the University at Buffalo, New York, conclude.
Temple and her team looked at how television affected "habituation to food cues." Habituation is the phenomenon that occurs when a person repeatedly provided with a food will eventually lose interest and stop eating it once they are full. Providing a new, unfamiliar food can disrupt this process, and a person will start eating again even if they're not hungry. Non-food stimuli may also disrupt habituation if a person's attention is distracted. Continue reading