NCL commends President for federal contractor minimum wage increase – National Consumers League

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February 12, 2014

Contact: Ben Klein, National Consumers League, (202) 835-3323, benk@nclnet.org

Washington, DC—The National Consumers League applauds President Obama’s leadership in signing an executive order to raise the minimum wage for employees of federal contractors to $10.10 an hour. The National Consumers League (NCL), the nation’s pioneering worker and consumer advocacy organization, commends the President for using executive powers to take a positive step for this group of minimum wage workers.

“As we all seek ways to close the growing wealth disparities in the United States, the President’s action is a big step up for thousands of workers struggling to make ends meet on the paltry federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour,” said Sally Greenberg, Executive Director of NCL. “We join so many allies, including Change To Win and the Good Jobs Nation, who have spent months demonstrating outside federal buildings calling on the President to use the power of the pen to help lift these low income workers out of poverty.”

The Executive Order mirrors the President’s State of the Union proposal for raising the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour. Similar legislation has been introduced in the U.S. Senate by Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA), and in the U.S. House of Representatives by Rep. George Miller (D-CA); both bills are stalled in Congress.. 

NCL has joined worker advocacy groups in supporting one-day strikes at federally operated buildings including Union Station and the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum, to ask President Obama to do what is right by those who work in federal facilities.  Many low-income workers shared their stories of wage theft, working overtime with no additional pay, unsafe working conditions, and lack of benefits or raises over many years. These workers bravely went on strike, putting their jobs in jeopardy, to demonstrate and tell their stories.  

Many Americans are often surprised to learn that workers in these facilities are so poorly paid that they must rely on taxpayer-funded relief programs for food, housing, and healthcare assistance.

“We are so gratified that the President and Labor Secretary Tom Perez have heard our pleas on behalf of workers at the lowest end of the economic spectrum. A federal executive order increasing the wages the US government’s contractors pay will have a ripple effect across the economy. We applaud the President and his Administration listening to these workers and acting on their behalf,” said Michell McIntyre, NCL’s Outreach Director, Labor and Worker Rights.

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About the National Consumers League 
The National Consumers League, founded in 1899, is America’s pioneer consumer organization. Its mission is to protect and promote social and economic justice for consumers and workers in the United States and abroad. For more information, visit www.nclnet.org.

Consumer, labor, health groups call on Walgreens to end tobacco sales – National Consumers League

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February 12, 2014

Contact: Ben Klein, National Consumers League, (202) 835-3323, benk@nclnet.orgor Matt Painter, Change to Win, (646) 705-3128, matthew.painter@changetowin.org

Washington, DC—The National Consumers League, Center for Science in the Public Interest and Change to Win Retail Initiatives are turning up the heat on Walgreens over selling cigarettes, following the decision by CVS Caremark to discontinue tobacco sales.  In a letter sent today to the company’s CEO Greg Wasson, the coalition of consumer, labor and public health organizations are calling the nation’s largest drugstore chain to stop selling and advertising tobacco products.

 “[R]emoving tobacco products from your stores would be consistent with Walgreen’s mission statement to help consumers ‘get, stay and live well,’” the letter reads.  “We also believe that Walgreen’s interest in becoming a leading provider of an expanding range of health care services, including services targeted at those suffering from tobacco-related diseases, would be served by following CVS’s example.”

The coalition’s letter comes one week after CVS, country’s second largest pharmacy chain, pledged to stop selling cigarettes later this year.  Earlier in the week, a group of eight Democratic senators also asked Wasson and Walgreens to ban tobacco.  The company says it is “evaluating” its tobacco policy.

Read the full letter below (or download PDF here):

Greg Wasson
Chief Executive Officer
Walgreen Co. 
200 Wilmot Road 
Deerfield, IL 60015

Dear Mr. Wasson:

As you know, the CVS drugstore chain announced last week that it would stop selling tobacco products.  We are writing to ask that you, as CEO of Walgreens, consider taking the same bold step by removing tobacco from your shelves and ceasing to advertise tobacco in your stores.

Indeed, removing tobacco products from your stores would be consistent with Walgreens’ mission statement to help consumers “get, stay and live well.”  We also believe that Walgreens’ interest in becoming a leading provider of an expanding range of health care services, including services targeted at those suffering from tobacco-related diseases, would be served by following CVS’s example.

We know that your company understands the devastation caused by tobacco. Cigarette smoking is the leading cause of preventable death in America, accounting for roughly one in five deaths annually.  In addition to lung cancer and heart disease, new research shows a growing list of ailments caused by smoking including diabetes, colorectal and liver cancers, vision loss, tuberculosis and complications of pregnancy.

Selling tobacco products is therefore at odds with Walgreens’ stated mission to promote health.  Many professional and public health organizations—including the American Pharmacists Association and the American Medical Association—support bans on tobacco sales in pharmacies. 

In addition, a poll of more than 2,500 pharmacists and pharmacy students found that only 1.6 percent support selling cigarettes in a pharmacy environment. Public opinion research and the consumers’ responses to CVS’s announcement indicate that the public also wants tobacco out of drugstores.

Tobacco’s tragic impact on our communities is clear. We urge Walgreens to stop selling tobacco products and set an example for the nation.

Thank you for your attention to our concerns.

Sincerely,

Sally Greenberg, Executive Director, National Consumers League

Michael Jacobson, Executive Director, Center for Science in the Public Interest

Nell Geiser, Associate Director, Change to Win Retail Initiatives

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About the National Consumers League

The National Consumers League, founded in 1899, is America’s pioneer consumer organization. Its mission is to protect and promote social and economic justice for consumers and workers in the United States and abroad. For more information, visitwww.nclnet.org.

About Center for Science in the Public Interest

Since 1971, CSPI has been a strong advocate for nutrition and health, food safety, alcohol policy, and sound science. For more information, visit www.cspi.org.

About Change to Win Retail Initiatives

Change to Win Retail Initiatives is committed to making retailers more accountable and transparent to all stakeholders. For more information, visitwww.changetowin.org.

We remember Robin Romano – National Consumers League

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Robin Romano rarely entered a room unnoticed.

As a friend said recently, he was a “whirling dervish of a man.” He exuded energy, passion, and humor—all three bubbled out of him. He was rarely quiet. And he had a lot to talk about. He made it his life’s work to document child labor in its worst forms. He traveled the world looking for injustice, focusing public attention on the exploitation of children. 

At a eulogy in New York, Pharis Harvey, the founder of the International Labor Rights Fund and a pioneer in modern child labor advocacy, called him “a loose cannon for justice.”

“The heat of his moral imperative was more than he could contain,” said Sam Morris, who worked with Robin on multiple films.

We lost Robin in early November, when he passed away unexpectedly. It seemed impossible that this firebrand could be gone. As I attended his memorial service in New York, I don’t think I was alone in expecting him to walk in the door and say, “The joke’s on you…the rumors of my demise have been greatly exaggerated.”

Robin was only 57, but everyone thought he was younger. He had piercing blue eyes that were constantly smiling or glowering. Robin was often outraged. How could you not be? A quarter of a billion children were toiling in the most harrowing of circumstances and no one seemed to care. Millions were enslaved. Millions were trapped in bonded labor.

Robin’s outrage was often tempered with a mischievous delight in making people laugh.  He was a jokester who loved making prank phone calls. He would call and, in an exaggerated, exotic accent—with mock-outrage—accuse us of using child labor or failing to pay our taxes.

SCI first met Robin over a dozen years ago when I learned that he and his filmmaking partner Len Morris were working on the first feature length film about child labor, Stolen Childhoods. At the time, 250 million children were trapped in child labor, but the child labor advocacy community was having a hard time getting people to care about them.  We needed to put a face on the problem and Stolen Childhoods promised to do just that. Robin and Len roamed around the globe filming shocking scenes of child labor—often at great peril. They fled for their lives on more than one occasion.

Their lens captured young boys on fishing platforms, young girls working as domestic servants or forced into prostitution. They filmed children laboring in stone quarries, brick kilns, and coffee plantations. They showed a range of child labor and conditions that horrified the public.

When we met, Robin and Len were interested in adding to the nearly completed Stolen Childhoods a segment about child farmworkers in the US—a vestige of child labor that still haunts America today.

At the time, I worked for the Association of Farmworker Opportunity Programs, a CLC member that had been trying to highlight this issue for years. Through our contacts with local farmworker groups in Texas, we helped Robin and Len locate working children hidden on back country roads in the vast expanse of Texas.

I accompanied Robin and Len on the shoot for a few days, and watched them film dozens of children working with razor-sharp scissors, harvesting onions for about a penny a pound. Temperatures were in the high 90s and sometimes went over 100. One girl, 10, was so sick she could barely talk. One small boy, also 10, worked barefoot at a pace that most men could not match. The work was back-breaking and many families had three generations toiling in the fields. It wasn’t difficult to see what the future held for many children.

Robin and Len worked tirelessly to get their story. Robin stood in the fields with a video camera and SC1several still cameras draped over his shoulders and on his belt, going back and forth, shooting stills in color and black and white. He was so covered in cameras, he almost didn’t look human.

Field shots were followed by visits to some of the homes of the workers 90 miles away. Robin would put in a 10 hour day and then once back at the hotel, chain smoke a few cigarettes and go for a long run. I didn’t know how he did it. “He had no body clock,” said Pharis Harvey. Eventually, “he would just collapse.”

Other films followed. In 2010, he and Dutch journalist Miki Mastrati made The Dark Side of Chocolate, unveiling the hidden child labor and trafficking in West Africa that helps produce the chocolate that we all love. In 2011, he directed The Harvest/La Cosecha, a feature length film that explored the physical and emotional toll on three child farmworkers.

The NGO community heralded these films, organizing public education and advocacy around each of them. Robin pushed tirelessly for solutions to the problems he exposed, regularly participating in our Child Labor Coalition strategy sessions long after his films were made.

Occasionally, he would get groups to pay for his brilliant photography, but when they could not find the budget for them, he shared them for free. He knew we needed the ammunition for the war we were waging. “He went everywhere and shot everything,” noted Harvey.

In the years since Robin and Len started filming Stolen Childhoods, the number of child laborers in the world has dropped by 80 million. I feel certain that Robin Romano played a crucial role in helping bring that decrease about. Robin has been such an integral part of our advocacy it is hard to imagine our work moving forward without him, but we know that he would have demanded that we continue.

If you would like to join the Child Labor Coalition and its members  for our “Remembering Robin” memorial event this Thursday, February 13, in Washington, DC, please RSVP  here.

FDA delays approval of first-ever drug treatment for low sexual desire in women – National Consumers League

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February 11, 2014

Contact: NCL Communications, Ben Klein, (202) 835-3323, benk@nclnet.org

Washington, DC – In response to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) decision to further delay approval of the first-ever drug to treat the most common female sexual disorder, the National Consumers League and the National Organization for Women, joined by women’s health and advocacy organizations, are calling on the FDA to move swiftly to end the 16 year wait for women in treatment of sexual dysfunction.  The FDA has approved 24 drugs for the treatment of male sexual dysfunctions –but has yet to approve a single treatment for women suffering from distressing low sexual desire. 

This decision – which is critically important for women’s health and well-being – came as a result of a dispute filed with the FDA to reconsider their two time position that they need more data to support approval of a medication to treat HSDD. This treatment has been studied in clinical trials with 15x the median number of patients for new drug approvals between 2005-2012 at the FDA, according to data from the Journal of the American Medical Association.  Over 11,000 women in clinical trials for a medical treatment for HSDD is more than any approved male sexual health drug. In fact, the 24th drug approval for male sexual dysfunction came just months ago with only 832 subjects and a serious set of side effects like penile rupture or other serious injury to the penis.

“This FDA decision is an unfortunate setback, requiring the only promising treatment for female sexual dysfunction to jump through more unnecessary hoops.  It also suggests that a double standard exists for evaluating drugs to treat women for low sexual desire; that said, we will hope to see an approved medical treatment for HSDD –for women sometime in the coming year,” said Sally Greenberg, Executive Director of the National Consumers League.

“The National Organization for Women has a long history of looking at the standards by which FDA approves drugs for women and there is clearly a bias here.  When it comes to approving drugs for male sexual dysfunction, the FDA says yes with more limited research and serious side effects, but when it comes to women, their go-slow tactics are preventing us from having access to a treatment option where we make the decision in consultation with our healthcare provider,” said Terry O’Neill, President of the National Organization for Women.

 

This week’s decision comes after advocacy organizations such as the National Consumers League, the National Organization for Women and the National Council of Women’s Organizations commenced a dialogue with the FDA over women’s need for a safe and effective treatment and the far reaching implications their decision would have.  A group of advocates met with officials at the FDA in January to discuss their concerns about the lack of safe and effective treatments for women. “This request for even more testing, more time, in short, more hurdles, to bring this treatment to women seems inconsistent with the standards that other drugs are held too, particularly male sexual drugs,” Greenberg and O’Neill added.

In January, the International Society for the Study of Women’s Sexual Health released a poll revealing that almost two-thirds of American women believe that it’s inappropriate that the score is 24-0 when it comes to federal approval of treatments for desire, arousal or orgasm dysfunction in men vs. women. The poll, conducted by Public Policy Polling, also found that 54 percent of respondents say that drug treatments for women should not be held to stricter standards for approval than men’s sexual health drugs. 

 

Groups Supporting Treatment for Women’s Sexual Disorder:
American Sexual Health Association (ASHA)
Association for Reproductive Health Professionals (ARHP)
Black Women’s Health Imperative (BWHI)
Center for Health and Gender Equity (CHANGE)
International Society for the Study of Women’s Sexual Health (ISSWSH)
Jewish Women International (JWI)
National Consumers League (NCL)
National Council of Women’s Organizations (NCWO)
National Hispanic Medical Association (NHMA)
National Organization for Women (NOW)
Nurse Practitioners in Women’s Health (NPWH)
Society for Women’s Health Research (SWHR)

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About the National Consumers League
The National Consumers League, founded in 1899, is America’s pioneer consumer organization. Our mission is to protect and promote social and economic justice for consumers and workers in the United States and abroad. For more information, visit www.nclnet.org.

Consumer group praises CVS for leadership on reducing American tobacco use – National Consumers League

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February 6, 2014

Contact: NCL Communications, Ben Klein, (202) 835-3323, benk@nclnet.org

Washington, DC—The National Consumers League, the nation’s pioneering consumer advocacy organization, established in 1899, applauds CVS Caremark for its decision to stop selling tobacco products in their stores nationwide by October 2014. This decision will remove tobacco products from 7,600 stores and makes CVS the first national pharmacy chain to cease the sale of tobacco products.

Smoking is the leading cause of premature death in the United States, with 480,000 deaths annually. The number of Americans who use tobacco products has decreased drastically in the last 50 years – in 1965, 42 percent of Americans smoked, today, 18 percent of Americans smoke. In the last ten years, however, the rate of smokers has remained stagnant.

“This decision demonstrates that CVS is willing to put the nation’s health above profits,” said Sally Greenberg, NCL executive director. “Reducing the percentage of Americans who smoke is a challenge that will require collaboration by both private and public actors. We hope that other national chain drug retailers follow suit.”

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About the National Consumers League
The National Consumers League, founded in 1899, is America’s pioneer consumer organization. Our mission is to protect and promote social and economic justice for consumers and workers in the United States and abroad. For more information, visit www.nclnet.org.

Chipotle beefs up sustainable agriculture efforts – National Consumers League

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kelsey As if it weren’t enough that the restaurant chain Chipotle revolutionized the extremely affordable, locally sourced and 100% delicious fast food meal, now they’re speaking out against the unsustainable and inhumane nature of industrial agriculture. And they’re doing so in the most entertaining way. The satirical series, “Farmed and Dangerous,” calling out big agriculture is set to debut February 17, on Hulu.

When I first heard about this series, I was skeptical. But then it dawned on me that Chipotle does some great things when sourcing their meat and dairy products, holding their producers to higher standards than pretty much every other fast food chain.

The 30 minute, four episode, series seeks to raise consumers’ awareness about industrial farming issues by taking a very serious, grim subject and satirically highlighting its biggest problems. This “values integration” raises awareness about issues the company combats and in return consumers view Chipotle in a positive light and will eat there in an opportunity to support their efforts.

It’s not Chipotle’s first stab at this blended marketing approach they’re calling ‘strategic entertainment.’ The Scare Crow (2013), Back to the Start (2011) and Meat Without Drugs (2012) are all short films about the disturbing tactics used by large industrial farms.  As a matter of fact, this approach isn’t new at all.  Proctor & Gamble created “soap operas” as a means of cross promotion; as did Ovaltine with shows like Captain Midnight back in the 1950s.  The return to such marketing tactics is most likely driven by consumers ability to skip commercials altogether, with technology like DVR and Netflix.  Even Whole Foods is slated to be releasing a new reality series called “Dark Rye.”

The series mentions Chipotle only once, as a means of debunking the current rumor that McDonald’s owns a controlling stake in the company. The share was indeed held by McDonald’s for eight years but they divested in 2006.

Full disclosure, the episodes will air on a Chipotle branded Hulu account but maybe they deserve to claim these efforts. So often we see commercials with entertaining but meaningless messages. Chipotle could have just as easily spent their money on a thirty second super bowl ad, but instead they chose to spread a message they believe in while getting the most possible bang for their buck. I know I’ll be watching.

Script Your Future launches third annual student competition for innovations in medication adherence – National Consumers League

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February 5, 2014

Contact: NCL Communications, Ben Klein, (202) 835-3323, benk@nclnet.org

Washington, DC—The month of February marks the launch of the third annual Medication Adherence Team Challenge, a month-long inter-collegiate competition among health profession student teams and faculty for creating solutions to raise awareness about medication adherence as a critical public health issue. The Challenge, coordinated by the National Consumers League (NCL), America’s pioneer consumer group and the lead organization on the national Script Your Future campaign, is returning to university campuses across the country after a successful two years of student innovation. 

With nearly three out of four Americans not taking their medications as directed—which results in serious health consequences, especially for people with chronic diseases—the National Consumers League and its partners in the Script Your Future campaign are managing a 3-year public education program to raise awareness of the importance of medication adherence. The Challenge is part of Script Your Future, which was launched in 2011 by NCL with more than 130 public and private stakeholder organizations.

This year’s Challenge is sponsored by the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy (AACP), the National Association of Chain Drug Stores (NACDS) Foundation, the American Medical Association (AMA), the National Community Pharmacists Association (NCPA), American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN), and the American Pharmacists Association (APhA). 

“This year’s Student Challenge is strengthened by the involvement of a diverse group of sponsors from multiple sectors of the health care system. One of the best hopes we have to improve America’s culture of nonadherence is to train the next generation of health care professionals to be proactive about engaging their patients, and that starts in the classroom through the innovation brought forward by health professions faculty,” said Sally Greenberg, NCL Executive Director.

“The success of the Script Your Future Adherence Challenge over the last two years demonstrates the power of student pharmacists to collaborate with their health profession counterparts to reach out to their communities and engage patients and caregivers to improve health through better adherence,” said Dr. Lucinda L. Maine, Executive Vice President and CEO at the American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy.  “This year’s Challenge continues to build on the strength of the inter-professional health care team to move the needle on medication adherence.”

The Medication Adherence Team Challenge is a month-long outreach project that will be held in February 2014 to engage interdisciplinary student teams from pharmacy, medicine, nursing, and other health professions to tackle the problem of poor adherence. The teams will be implementing creative solutions and outreach in their communities to raise awareness and improve understanding about medication adherence, using Script Your Future materials.  At the end of the Challenge, select schools or colleges will be recognized nationally for their efforts to improve medication adherence. In 2013, the 18th Surgeon General of the United States, Dr. Regina Benjamin, presented the student winners with their awards at a ceremony in Washington, DC.

“Everyone wins when patients take their medication as prescribed to achieve optimal health outcomes,” said AMA President Ardis Dee Hoven, M.D. “As a sponsor of the challenge, the AMA is pleased to work with other health care professionals to improve the health of our patients and avoid unnecessary health problems.”  

“Greater medication adherence improves patients’ well-being and ultimately helps to drive down the costs of health care,” said NCPA CEO B. Douglas Hoey, RPh, MBA. “Independent community pharmacists are committed to proactively identifying solutions to improve patient adherence in their communities, and the Challenge is a terrific way to raise awareness among the next generation of pharmacists.”

“Given nursing’s strong commitment to enhancing patient safety and healthcare quality, AACN is committed to working with our colleagues in pharmacy, medicine, and other disciplines to promote the health benefits connected to proper medication adherence among students, clinicians, and the patients we serve,” said Dr. Geraldine “Polly” Bednash, CEO of the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN).

“Pharmacists have a unique opportunity, at the medication dispensing stage, to help patients understand the value of their prescription medications, to help alleviate confusion, and to underline the need for adherence, making a real difference in patients’ lives. We are excited to be involved in this program and what it means for the future of America’s adherence,” said APhA Executive Vice President and CEO Thomas E. Menighan, BSPharm, MBA, ScD (Hon), FAPhA.

Over the past two Challenges, more than 3,000 future health care professionals directly counseled more than 18,000 patients and reached more than three million consumers in this concerted public effort about the importance of medication adherence. Last year’s awardees, selected from participating colleges and schools of pharmacy and other health professions, included St. Louis College of Pharmacy, University of Charleston School of Pharmacy, University of the Pacific Thomas J. Long School of Pharmacy & Health Sciences, Touro University College of Pharmacy California, and The University of Mississippi School of Pharmacy.

To learn more about last year’s winners visit the Script Your Future website.

For more information on the Challenge visit the Challenge Community website athttps://syfadherencechallenge.ning.com/. Follow the Challenge on Twitter at #SYFchallenge and follow the campaign @IWillTakeMyMeds.

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About Script Your Future

Script Your Future is a campaign of the National Consumers League (NCL), a private, non-profit membership organization founded in 1899. NCL’s mission is to protect and promote social and economic justice for consumers and workers in the United States and abroad. For more information about the Script Your Future campaign, visit www.ScriptYourFuture.org. For more information on NCL, please visit www.nclnet.org.

Meet NCL’s new public policy intern – National Consumers League

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Hello readers, my name is Evelyn Wong and I’m the new intern here at NCL. I’m a Political Science major from the University of the Pacific (UOP) in California and I’ve decided to trade sunshine and temperate weather for the snow, wind, and rain of DC. I actually love the weather so far, because I think all Californians are enamored with snow. We’re also very covetous of rain right now!   

I’m here as part of the Washington Semester Program of American University. It’s a program that all my professors extolled as “life changing” and “an unforgettable experience.” I had actually found out about NCL and had met one of the staff, Lucinda Cassidy, at AU’s internship bazaar.

As part of the Justice and Law program at American, I am interested in a wide range of public policy issues, which is why I was drawn towards the internships of advocacy organizations like NCL. In particular, I’m interested in public policy areas that are focused on protecting consumer and workers’ interests . Since everyone is in this category, it is clear that the NCL plays a crucial role that affects everyone’s lifestyles and decisions. I am happy to be a part of such an important mission and I hope to contribute to their efforts while I’m here.

Treating cold or flu? Take special care with OTC meds – National Consumers League

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takewithcare.pngThere are more than 600 over-the-counter and prescription medications that contain acetaminophen making it the most commonly used drug ingredient in the United States. Acetaminpophen can be found in pain relievers, fever reducers, sleep aids, and cough, cold, and allergy medicine. It is especially important during cold and flu season to understand the dangers of mixing medicines.

When used correctly, acetaminophen is safe, effective, and able to treat many symptoms. When people take their medicine incorrectly, however, and consume more acetaminophen than the daily limit, serious liver damage is possible. The Know Your Dose campaign gives consumers three simple steps to make sure they do not misuse medicine containing acetaminophen:

  1. Make sure you read labels. Do not take more than the recommended doses on the label. Taking more acetaminophen than recommended can cause serious liver damage.
  2. Be aware of what medicine contains acetaminophen. Acetaminophen is listed as an active ingredient on over-the-counter drugs. On prescription drugs, it may be listed as “APAP” or “acetam.”
  3. Never take multiple medicines that contain acetaminophen. Using more than one medicine that contains Acetaminophen makes it much easier to accidentally overdose.

NCL recently launched TakeWithCare.org, an interactive site for teens to educate them about the safe use of OTC pain medications. In a study, a majority of teens self report having used OTC pain medications, but overall teens lack knowledge about OTC pain medications. There is little awareness of the active ingredients in their pain medications and they lack familiarity with acetaminophen. Only one in four (27%) teens said they knew what the active ingredient is in their most-often used OTC pain medication.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently issued a recommendation to limit the amount of acetaminophen in all prescription pain relievers nationwide to 325mg per dose to prevent unintentional overdose. This cold and flu season NCL is encouraging consumers, and teens especially, to double check and not double up on medicines.

If you aren’t aware of exactly what ingredients are in the product you’re taking, you are putting yourself at risk for doubling-up on the same active ingredient and exposing your body to the potential harm caused by overdosing. Many consumers who self treat pain and cold or flu symptoms may turn to more than one product, often multi-ingredient, without realizing that they’re putting themselves at potential risk of stomach or liver problems.

In February 2014, the American Gastroenterological Association (AGA) launched Gut Check: Know Your Medicine, an education campaign to encourage Americas to read the labels on their medication and be more aware of not taking multiple medications that include the same ingredients. The campaign includes a video that highlights the importance of reading and following OTC medicine labels

Visit TakeWithCare.org today and share this resource with teens in your community.  For more resources on safe use of acetaminophen, visit KnowYourDose.org.

Understanding GMOs – National Consumers League

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92_gmo.jpgFew agricultural issues are as controversial and complex as genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Tinkering with the genetics of food is bound to set off red flags for many, especially those who are concerned about environmental issues. It’s important, however, to consider many aspects: economics, health, policy, environment, regulation, and labeling are a handful of the most important aspects to consider when weighing GMO pros and cons.

Health is likely the most important concern to an American consumer. Is it safe to be eating GMOs? Evidence here is unclear, some proving theories that GMOs are harmful, others disproving them. As with any issue it’s important to approach evidence with an open mind making a decision based on which studies you find to be most accurate and representative. While it’s possible to see associations between the increase in corn DNA as well as the increase in various health issues, like obesity and autism, that doesn’t necessarily mean the two are connected. The same connections could be made between health issues and increases in other technologies like cell phones. Additionally, specific concerns about the creation of new allergens have been raised. Testing and controlling for known allergens from GMOs, is well developed but possible threats lie in the development of new, unknown allergens.

Environmental factors prove to be a point of contention for GMO stakeholders as well. The apparent increased use of herbicides is disconcerting to say the least. Upon further inspection, glyphosate is the most increased herbicide, many others have been decreased. Glyphosate is notably less harmful to humans than other herbicides, but it is so effective that it eliminates important biodiversity (i.e., insects and plants) on farms. Some good news is that overall insecticide use has decreased among GMOs. Some insects have already developed a resistance to some GE crops but scientists predict genetic engineering will continue to reduce the need for insecticides. Additionally, in some countries GMOs help with soil preservation by lending themselves to low and no till farming.

Patents prove to be an especially salient issue for farmers. GMO seeds that have been patented are more expensive and thus difficult for poorer farmers to obtain which puts undue financial strain on those farms. Labeling is perhaps the biggest issue in the news now. Washington State recent voted down a proposed bill to require the labeling of foods made with GMOs. It has been speculated that more of these bills will pop up in the near future, putting pressure on industry to voluntarily begin labeling or in some cases stop using GMOs altogether.

As the GMO issue continues to grow and change, it’s important for each of us to critically evaluate its components. An ever-increasing body of scientific evidence lends itself to our ability to make informed choices, an opportunity each of us should seize.