For years, charges have been made that a common chemical found in plastics, known as BPA, is responsible for birth defects, obesity and even cancer. And while activists have been successful getting their message into the media, they’ve been less successful in getting it validated by peer-reviewed science.
Stanford University has just published a new study on organic foods—reporting that its physicians and nutritionists found no evidence that organic foods are more nutritious.
A campaign is growing to pressure food companies and consumers into boycotting palm oil because of its alleged environmental impacts. But according to a new report by the non-profit group, World Growth, palm oil is a highly efficient source of food and fuel, and is a good way to produce fossil fuel alternatives and capture carbon from the atmosphere.
This week’s headlines: Another huge, awful outbreak of food-borne bacteria. This time the worst in modern history; perhaps 2000 sickened, and more than 20 dead. At least 500 cases of hemolytic uremic syndrome. That means liver damage—and potential death from kidney failure. More than 1000 cases of severe diarrhea. Usually it is the very young and the elderly who are most at risk of serious consequences, but this outbreak targeted young adults, mostly women.
Extended droughts were far worse in the Little Ice Age that ended just 150 years ago, but big droughts are also likely in the world’s future if we are in a new warming cycle. This prospect pushes the un-exciting Black-Eyed Pea into an unlikely starring role.
In the old days, we cooked hamburgers rare, juicy and flavorful. In recent years, because of E. coli 0157:H7, we’ve had to content ourselves with hamburgers that were gray and dry or run the risk of serious illness. E. coli 0157:H7 is the relatively new and vicious “Jack-in-the-Box” bacteria that killed four kids in Seattle in 1993. It was seen first by researchers in the 1980s. Since then, it has killed hundreds and sickened thousands more with bloody diarrhea, severe abdominal cramps, and even liver failure.
Worried about how milk and meat production are causing global warming, singer Paul McCartney and the U.N. recently launched a campaign in Europe called “Less Meat=Less Heat” while other activists are promoting “meatless Mondays.”
Are organic foods healthier and better for the environment? While many may believe so, such is not the contention of a provocative new book called The Truth About Organic Foods by Alex Avery of the Center for Global Food Issues.
While taste and quality may spur some consumers to purchase organic fruits and vegetables, it appears their benefits to the natural world are clearly less appealing.
Freedom 21, of which CFACT was a co-founding organization, is a coalition of groups that came together, quite literally, in the waning days of the last century, to build a domestic and international movement that could promote freedom as the guiding principle for the 21st Century and beyond.
If someone were to ask you to rattle off some of the not-so-pleasant thoughts that occupy your mind day to day, nagging back pain, getting the kids to soccer practice on time, your old clunker about to go kaput, or your baseball team being fifteen games back at the All-Star break might be some of the things you would mention. But whether or not there'll be enough food to buy tomorrow -- well, that's hardly something over which you or anyone you know probably loses any sleep.