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FDA probing nutrition claims on food packages

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FDA probing nutrition claims on food packages

U.S. regulators are examining the growing number of nutrition claims found on the front of food packages after complaints that they give a misleading picture of their health benefits, officials said in a warning to food companies on Tuesday.

The Food and Drug Administration is trying to determine if any claims violate federal food labeling rules and “will take enforcement action against any egregious examples,” FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg told reporters.

FDA officials also are developing a proposed regulation to define nutritional criteria for claims made on the front of food packages, Hamburg said.

The FDA is acting as companies increasingly add nutrition claims to the front of packages to catch the attention of hurried shoppers who might not read the detailed facts about a food’s content on the back, she added.

“Some nutritionists have questioned whether this information is more marketing-oriented than health-oriented, and judging from some of the labels that we have seen, we think this is a valid concern,” Hamburg said.

In a letter to food companies, the agency said it was “currently analyzing (front-of-package) labels that appear to be misleading.”

Asked to give examples of questionable claims, Hamburg said some foods with almost 50 percent sugar were displaying a “Smart Choices” checkmark. Other package fronts boast a high percentage of the recommended daily vegetable intake but fail to mention that the products contain 80 percent of the suggested fat allowance, she said. She did not name specific products.

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Healthier U.S. school meals boost costs: study

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Healthier U.S. school meals boost costs: study

Improving nutritional value of U.S. school food programs by increasing servings of fruits, vegetables and whole grains could increase the cost of breakfast by as much as 25 percent and lunch by 9 percent, according to a report released on Tuesday.

A report from the Institute of Medicine, an arm of the National Academies, proposed updating school meal programs to meet nutritional needs and foster better eating habits, but recognized healthier, fresher ingredients would boost costs, especially at breakfast where fruit servings would increase.

“It will cost a little more,” Virginia Stallings, a professor at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and chair of the group that conducted the study, said in an interview.

“But this will be a very wise investment in children’s health,” she added.

Most school food providers would need more government money to help pay for food, training and equipment, the report said.

The Institute of Medicine conducted the review of the country’s school breakfast and lunch programs at the request of the U.S. Agriculture Department, which oversees them. School meal programs provide 40 million meals daily and more than half of students’ food and nutrient intake during the school day.

Child nutrition programs, which cost about $21 billion a year, are due for reauthorization this year but Congress is not expected to approve an overhaul for some time.

Officials at the USDA are updating the nutrition and meal requirements used for school breakfast and lunch programs, and looked for recommendations from the Institute of Medicine. The framework, last updated in 1995, sets food and nutrient standards that must be met by school programs to qualify for cash reimbursements and food from the government.

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Bowel disease drugs increase cancer risk: study

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Bowel disease drugs increase cancer risk: study

Some treatments for inflammatory bowel disease increase the risk of infection-related cancers, French scientists said on Monday, but the benefits of the drugs still outweigh the risks.

Thiopurine drugs — immunosuppressive medicines that inhibit the body’s immune system — are regularly used to treat inflammatory bowel disease, the researchers said, but can increase the risk of cancers linked to viral infections.

Laurent Beaugerie and colleagues at the Saint-Antoine hospital in Paris looked at more than 19,000 patients with inflammatory bowel disease. Around 30 percent of the patients were taking thiopurines, 14 percent had stopped taking them and 56 percent had never taken them.

Following up after almost 3 years, the researchers found 23 new cases of cancers — one of Hodgkin’s lymphoma and 22 of non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

Statistical analysis showed that patients receiving thiopurines — like azathioprine produced by several generic drugmakers and by GlaxoSmithKline as Imuran — had a more than five-fold increased risk of lymphoma compared with those who had never received the drugs, the researchers said in a study published in The Lancet journal.

Older male patients with a longer history of inflammatory bowel disease also had increased lymphoma cancer risk.

“The absolute cumulative risk…in young patients receiving a 10-year course of thiopurines remains low — (less than 1 percent) — and does not undermine the positive risk-benefit ratio of these drugs,” the researchers wrote.

But for elderly patients and for unlimited treatment periods, more studies were needed to assess the risk, they said.

Commenting on the study, Geert D’Haens of the Imelda GI Clinical Research Center and Paul Rutgeerts University Hospital Gasthuisberg, both in Belgium, said doctors should be cautious in prescribing thiopurines for prolonged periods.

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