Jill Replogle is a researcher-reporter for FairWarning.
Throngs of consumers line up for Big Macs and Chicken McNuggets every day but that doesn't mean that thousands of people also can come together to sue McDonald's Corp. for making them fat. Bloomberg reports that a federal judge in New York has turned down a bid by two plaintiffs [...]
Will consumers soon be able to face the facts about the amount of sugar, salt and fat in their food? Two major food industry groups have announced general plans to provide "straightforward nutrition information" on the front of grocery products, starting early next year. In a news release, the Grocery Manufacturers [...]
Texas researchers have identified a link between air pollution and spina bifida, one of the most common disabling birth defects. A new study published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives found that mothers exposed to high levels of benzene, a chemical emitted by cars and oil refineries, are more likely [...]
Officials of major U.S. airlines say they have started taking voluntary steps to improve the safety of their partner commuter air carriers. The Wall Street Journal reports that industry representatives, in their most specific response yet to critics of commuter airline safety, have told the National Transportation Safety Board that [...]
As Americans increasingly put food from U.S. megafarms or foreign producers on their dinner plates, the nation's food safety system is being overtaxed, leaving consumers at risk, Christian Science Monitor reports. The food safety system, the Monitor notes, was build on 70-year-old laws "written before genetic engineering was invented, frozen [...]
Thyroid cancer patients may be unwittingly exposing others to radiation after they leave the hospital and take public transportation, stay in hotel rooms, or sleep next to pregnant women, according to a congressional investigation. The investigation, spearheaded by Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass, drew on questionnaires sent to states and a survey [...]
Fatal crashes involving teen drivers dropped by more than a third between 2004 and 2008, according to a new report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that gives part of the credit to restrictions on novice drivers. Along with state laws barring teens from driving late at night [...]
Think that a four-wheel, all-terrain vehicle provides more protection in a nasty spill than a two-wheel dirt bike? Think again. New research by a Johns Hopkins University team found that victims of ATV crashes were 50 percent more likely to die of their injuries than people in off-road motorcycle crashes. [...]
Less than a week after the dramatic rescue of 33 trapped Chilean miners, China is in midst of a tragic mining disaster. Bloomberg, citing the Xinhua News agency, reports that rescue crews have recovered the bodies of 32 workers from a coal mine in the city of Yuzhou, where a [...]
The Food and Drug Administration has taken the unprecedented step of rescinding approval of a patch used in knee surgeries after admitting it had succumbed to political pressure in approving it. The patch, called Menaflex Collagen Scaffold and marketed by New Jersey-based ReGen Biologics, received FDA approval in 2008 for repairing and reinforcing [...]
CVS Pharmacy Inc. agreed to pay $77.6 million to settle allegations that its drugstores sold large amounts of cough and cold medicines with the ingredient pseudoephedrine to criminal traffickers, who used it to make the highly addictive stimulant methamphetamine. In an agreement negotiated with the U.S. Attorney's Office in Los Angeles, [...]
Tests commissioned by a California-based environmental group working with the state attorney general's office have found illegally high lead content in children's products at the Walmart and Target retail chains. The Center for Environmental Health said the lead was discovered in toddlers' green and yellow beanbag chairs, youth boxing gloves, toy [...]
Airline industry officials are trying to water down a safety measure in a law passed this summer by Congress that calls for airline co-pilots to have at least 1,500 hours of flying experience, the same as required of captains, the Associated Press reports. The push for rules easing the experience [...]
The Canadian government has officially listed BPA, a chemical used widely in consumer plastics and food cans, as a toxic substance. The listing will make it easier to ban the use of BPA in specific products, The New York Times reports. However, the country's next move will likely be to [...]
Children increasingly are being hospitalized with injuries -- often traumatic brain injuries -- from all-terrain vehicle accidents, a new study shows. A Johns Hopkins University research team found that 4,039 children up to age 17 were admitted at hospitals for ATV-related injuries in 2006. That was 2½ times higher than [...]