Moomin Land

I've been extremely busy preparing for my course that I'll be teaching this summer. It's a graduate course on Information Research in Public Health. I've also been extremely busy trying to plan and prepare my trip to Sweden and Denmark. I'll also be staying at Hotel Royal and Hotel Elite. Very swanky, indeed. Not surprising, I haven't had proper time to post on my blog (which I think only 1.5 persons read). Nevertheless, this is not without thinking about public health and traveling! This article sums up nicely the types of things that I've been questioning before my big trip to Scandinavia. According the WHO report, the US is 37th out of 190 industrialized countries whereas Sweden is 23rd and Denmark is 34th. But some experts disagree and criticize the model for using inconsistent measurements. For example, the OEC's report, which is more rigorous and uses controlled measures, found the US at the bottom of 6 industrialized countries. The OEC also reports that the US spends more on healthcare than any other country (a very well known fact), but that citizens receive far less than other countries (again, another well known fact in health policy). Presumably, much of this will be discussed in Sicko which opens in the US on June 29th. If I weren't going to be in Scandinavia, guess where I'd be on the 29th?

The Sugar Cereal Policy Change

While eating my COOP purchased delicious organic granola, raspberries, and soy milk for breakfast I read an interesting article in the NYTs about The Kellogg's Company and their advertisements targeting children. Actually, the Times printed the same exact article twice, but one was printed in the Business section and the other was in the Media and Advertisement section. The brief summation of their new policy is this:

The Kellogg Company announced today that it will phase out advertising its products to children under age 12 unless the foods meet specific nutrition guidelines for calories, sugar, fat and sodium.

Kellogg also announced that it would stop using licensed characters or branded toys to promote foods unless the products meet the nutrition guidelines.

It should be noted that these are voluntary changes. Well, voluntary after being threatened by a couple of angry parents, the Center for Science in the Public Interest, and the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood. I'm certainly not against these policy changes, but digging a little further into the guidelines I found myself taking issue with some of the details.

The guidelines state:

Foods advertised on media—including TV, radio, print, and third-party websites—that have an audience of 50 percent or more children under age 12 will have to meet Kellogg’s new nutrition standards, which require that one serving of the food has:

• No more than 200 calories;

• No trans fat and no more than 2 grams of saturated fat;

• No more than 230 milligrams of sodium (except for Eggo frozen waffles);

• No more than 12 grams of sugar (excluding sugar from fruit, dairy, and vegetables).

In addition, Kellogg will not:

• Advertise to children under 12 in schools and preschools.

• Sponsor product placements for any products in any medium primarily directed at kids

under 12;

• Use licensed characters on mass-media advertising directed primarily to kids under 12, as a basis for a food form, or on the front labels of food packages unless those foods meet the nutrition standards;

• Use branded toys in connection with foods that do not meet the nutrition standards.

But when reading the NYTs article, I learned the following:

1. Eggo frozen waffles are exempt from the Sodium regulation

2. Kellogg could still advertise Frosted Flakes to children because it has 11 grams of sugar

3. Kellogg said it would introduce Nutrition at a Glance labels on the top right corner of cereal boxes this year.

My response:

1. Why are eggo waffels exempt? Which other items are exempt?

2. Frosted Flakes has *only* 11 grams of sugar per serving? That's shocking. Will they reformulate their products so that they all fall under the 12 gram of sugar per serving since children are their most reliable market (i.e. Cococrispies has 14 grams of sugar. I'm sure it's not that difficult to change the amt. of sugar to be slightly less than it already is)? And besides, 11 grams of sugar is still ridiculously high. Plus, nobody ever eats the suggested serving size.

3. Most people don't know how to read the nutritional facts even if in a pretty snapshot on the top right corner of a product. I'm sure that there are plenty of research based articles measuring the general population's ability to read nutritional information federally mandated to be listed on all food items. I'm sure I can find one before the day is over. :-)

Bees and Honey are Good for You!

I have just read two very interesting articles in The Economist about bees and honey. Both articles were published in the Science and Technology section, but the wit of the editors seemed to have gone down the toilette as they did not see the more interesting article that should have emerged by blending the two articles. Unfortunately, you need to have a subscription to The Economist to read their articles online, but I'll summarize.

The first article, Dying Bees, discusses the Colony Collapse Disorder , when the inhabitants of bee hives suddenly disappear, that is taking place in North America, Greece, Italy, Poland, Portugal and Spain. Scientists have cast doubt that cell phones are causing the bee colonies to die. They suggest that statistically insignificant data surrounding a study looking at electromagnetic radiation was misinterpreted. Back to the drawing board. Now scientists are looking at the practice of beekeepers such as the constant upheaval and movement around the country in seek of the best rate for *their* pollination services which is causing stress on the hives. Scientists are also research the bee genome along with the overall social networking of bees. The search continues...

The second article, The Medicinal Use of Honey, discusses the benefits of honey in combating superinfections, drug resistant trains of pathogens. Apparently honey was commonly used as medicine long before the discovery of antibiotics and is still used in Australia and New Zealand. Presently there is a massive study at Bonn University Children's Clinic in Germany comparing the effectiveness of a honey based treatment, such as those created by Medihoney, with antibiotics when treating wounds. The preliminary research all points in the direction of honey being a strong contender to antibiotics.

Now back to the editors at The Economist: an opportunity was clearly missed. The level of economic analysis could have been much richer. Perhaps they'll tidy up their reporting on bees and take note of Einstein's alleged insight into bees:

"if the bee disappeared off the surface of the globe, then man would have only four years of life left. No more bees, no more pollination, no more plants, no more animals, no more man."

p.s. As I was writing this post in the hot and sunny confines of my apartment a bee found it's way through the security gates on my window. For the first time in my life, I was thrilled to see a bee!

Mini Sojourn

Last week I was working at the library and found little energy at the end of the day to post. I'm working from home for the next few weeks and hope to find a healthy rhythm for regular blogging.

I just read an interesting article in the NYTs that discusses memory and recall, something I struggle with constantly. The article, Decreased Demands on Cognitive Control Reveal the Neural Processing Benefits of Forgetting, describes a study that was published in Nature Neuroscience. In sum, the researchers show by mapping the neural networks of the brain that forgetfulness is an adaptive neural response. If you're interested in reading the full-text of the article, I would suggest submitting an Interlibrary Loan at your public, university, or work library. My library's electronic subscription has a 1-year embargo which means that this current issues is not available. If you're interested in reading more about the cost-benefit-analysis of print versus electronic journal subscriptions, I highly recommend reading this article published in D-Lib Magazine.