State LifeSmarts champs declared in Washington – National Consumers League

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This just in from the Evergreen State: A winner has been declared in Washington! Cheney High School has taken the crown of Washington State LifeSmarts Champions and are headed to Miami.

Wency Offril, in the office of the state coordinator, reports that Rob McKenna, Washington State Attorney General, stopped by the state competition, held earlier this month to make welcome remarks to the students, teachers, and coaches before the day of matches started and was gracious enough to stay to take pictures with each team.

Chief of the Consumer Protection Division had a great time serving as Question Master. Offril thanked coordinator Will Rance and his team of WSECU volunteers for putting on a fun day for all involved.

Follow the excitement of this and other Lifestate state competitions and the media coverage we’re seeing on our site.

Improving quality of food labels a priority for 2010 – National Consumers League

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The final post in a four-part series, in which we present the food issues we anticipate will affect American consumers the most in 2010.

By Courtney Brein, Linda Golodner Food Safety and Nutrition Fellow

Over the past several years, health claims on food labels have gained significant traction as an advertising tool, and products bearing such statements now litter the marketplace, boosted by a greater national attention to the obesity epidemic and relative inaction on the Food and Drug Administration’s part in reining in these advertising hooks. In the fall of 2008, the National Consumers League sent a letter to the FDA Commissioner (at the time – he’s since been replaced by Dr. Margaret A. Hamburg) Andrew von Eschenbach, drawing attention to General Mills’ use of drug-like claims about the cholesterol-lowering benefits of consuming Cheerios® – an action which prompted the agency to issue a warning letter to General Mills the following spring. Additionally, to deter the use of exaggerated claims by General Mills – and others – in the future, in September of 2009 NCL sued General Mills for claiming that eating Cheerios® would reduce total and “bad” cholesterol, a suit that currently awaits trial in the District of Columbia’s local court. Consumers should look to see the suit settled, and – ideally – a precedent set, sometime this year.

Later in fall 2009, shortly after NCL filed its lawsuit, the issue of front-of-package labeling gained widespread attention when a number of actors called for an FDA investigation of the “SmartChoices” program, leading the agency to announce its plan to better regulate such claims and the extensive group of participating manufacturers to suspend the program – at least for the time being. In its letter to the food industry, the FDA announced that it will develop a set of science-based standards to guide manufacturers in making front-of-package claims, in addition to determining whether particular labeling claims currently used on packaging are misleading, and the Smart Choices program announced it would voluntarily postpone operations. While the agency will not initially use regulatory tools to mandate new labeling standards, it has not ruled out such measures, should the industry not align its claims with the new guidelines. The FDA has also announced that it will continue to conduct consumer research to inform its work.

The FDA has not made its timeline for this work public; however, the Web site for First Lady Michelle Obama’s new “Let’s Move” initiative announced that the agency will complete guidance by the end of this year. Consumers should expect – and push for – industry action to follow. It is time to stem the tide of weak health claims that currently overwhelm consumers and detract from the usefulness of legitimate claims on truly nutritious products. Furthermore, the front of the package is not the only location where nutrition-related claims and statements can mislead consumers; while the nutrition facts panel provides critical information, it is not as user-friendly as it might be, and the current format enables food manufacturers to disguise some less appealing elements of products, such as moving added sugars down the list of ingredients by weight by listing various kinds of sweeteners separately, and claiming multiple servings for items conducive to single-serving consumption, such as 16 and 20 ounce beverages.

The Center for Science in the Public Interest recently published a suggested nutrition facts label makeover, which would rectify problems such as these and make the panel more useful to – and accurate for – consumers. An updated nutrition facts panel is long overdue, and deserving of the FDA’s attention in 2010. Regardless of whether the agency acts in the coming year, consumers should anticipate the issue garnering attention on the national stage, particularly with the publication of the 2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans.

Issuers to find loopholes in Credit CARD Act – National Consumers League

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The new Credit Card Accountability, Responsibility, and Disclosure Act — also known as the Credit CARD Act — goes into effect today, eliminating many of the industry’s worst practices haunting consumers. One of the most useful provisions of the new law requires issuers to disclose to consumers how long it will take to pay off the debt if they only pay the minimum monthly payments.

In her column Sunday, the Washington Post’s Michelle Singletary – and past NCL Trumpeter Award recipient – has identified for readers the new loopholes in the law that card issuers will no doubt take advantage of in order to balance the pro-consumer changes going into effect with their own interests. Which is their bottom line, she writes. Not yours.

Beginning Monday, some of the more outrageous practices of credit card issuers will be outlawed. But just like a bully on a playground who doesn’t punch when the teacher is watching, lenders will find ways to continue pummeling consumers.

Read Singletary’s full article here and start thinking about how these changes will affect your personal finances.

School lunch programs making parents queasy – National Consumers League

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By Sally Greenberg, NCL Executive Director

It should come as no surprise: food in the Washington, DC public school cafeterias is lousy and that kids dump the veggies into the trash – that is the latest dispatch from The Slow Cook himself Ed Bruske, a former Washington Post reporter who spent a week at his daughter’s DC elementary school cafeteria watching what got served up to the kiddies.

Bruske, who can usually be found in the pages of the Washington Post entertainingly describing attempts to make the perfect pot roast or risotto, got an eyeful at the school cafeteria. He details what goes into the meals we serve our kids and the ingredients sound both unappetizing and unhealthy: grey beef crumbles, pale-looking spaghetti sauce containing dextrose/and or high-fructose corn syrup, cheddar cheese that looks more like cottage cheese, scrambled eggs from a factory in Minnesota and shipped frozen to DC with an ingredient list that includes modified cornstarch, xanthan gum, liquid pepper extract, citric acid, lipolyzed butter (I have no idea what that is but it doesn’t sound good!), and medium chain triglycerides.

Bruske found that most meals were made from processed foods that had been precooked and frozen, all in an effort to keep the menus within the tight budgets allocated for school lunches. Meals are designed to require minimal time and skill, with freshness and flavor being the first to go. Schools Chancellor Michelle Rhee actually brought in a new food service, which was supposed to stress “fresh cooked” foods. Apparently that’s not working out as planned. Bruske also observed kids eating a breakfast of frosted cookies with soaring sugar content and chocolate and strawberry milk options that contain almost as much sugar per serving as a Coca-Cola. That’s a shame, because the children of Washington DC have one of the highest obesity rates in the country. DC might consider approaches other school systems have taken to get kids to eat healthier:

In a Lynnfield, MA, elementary school, officials have begun offering kids incentives—in the form of points that can be redeemed for things kids want including t-shirts, backpacks, skateboards, etc—when they choose healthier options. They offer an “imove menu” that includes chicken Caesar salad wraps, stir fry, pasta and broccoli salad, fresh fruit, carrot sticks, and yogurt. It also includes such kid favorites as chicken nuggets (albeit a low-fat, low-sodium version), lasagna, and pizza. The big difference is that pizza is never offered with a side of French fries; instead, its high-fat content is moderated with sides of green beans and yogurt. And the program’s been a success.

The Pine-Richland School District outside of Pittsburgh has switched to whole-grain rolls and pizza crusts and eliminated traditional French fries (today’s version is oven-baked, and even those aren’t allowed every day). The district offers a wide variety of seasonal fresh fruits and vegetables, including raw vegetables served as side dishes, and the high school occasionally serves brown rice instead of white. All lunch meats are turkey.

This list of innovative approaches to getting good healthy food into school cafeterias is too long for me to list. Another very good resource is “TwoAngryMoms.org” a group formed by parents unhappy about unhealthy offerings in school cafeterias. They have a terrific toolkit for changing how your child’s school approaches the meals served in their cafeterias and lots of good resources on *their Web site. Another insightful read is a blog, Fed up with School Lunch, following the experiences of an Illinois school teacher who has vowed to eat what the cafeteria is serving every day in 2010.

Discovering at a young age what it means to eat fresh, healthy, and delicious food is a gift that all children deserve. We are indebted to Bruske for telling us—in graphic detail—how much better we can and should be doing for the children of Washington, DC. Michelle Rhee, you have your work cut out for you!

*Links are no longer active as the original sources have removed the content, sometimes due to federal website changes or restructurings.

Health insurance reform: Should consumers foot the bill? – National Consumers League

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Update: at the press conference held by HHS Secretary Sebelius, a report, “Insurance Companies Prosper, Families Suffer: Our Broken Health Insurance System,” was released, calling for health care reform that would result in lower insurance premiums for consumers, as well as “placing additional oversight on health insurance companies to ensure that people get value for the premiums they pay.”

This just in: today, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius will hold a press conference to illustrate the national problem of insurers significantly raising the insurance premiums, particularly of those buying coverage individually.

Last week, Well Point and Sebelius squared off after it was revealed that one of the company’s health plans in California, Anthem, intended to raise premiums by as much as 39 percent. While both sides cite different motives, it is clear that rate increases of this magnitude are unmanageable for many consumers. It also demonstrates the greater issue of sky rocketing health care costs.

The people of this country need reform. We hope that politics and profit can be put aside in the interest of the American people when President Obama convenes a bi-partisan health summit next week.

Smile! It’s National Children’s Dental Health Month – National Consumers League

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By Mimi Johnson, NCL Health Policy Associate

This February, we celebrate National Children’s Dental Health Month. Each year, the American Dental Association spends February educating the public about the importance of good oral health and developing good habits early in life. You can help to spread the word by sending an “*Oral Health for Kids” e-Card.

According to the *Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, tooth decay affects children in the United States more than any other chronic infectious disease. More than half of all children have had some tooth decay, which when left untreated can cause pain so severe it hampers eating, speaking, playing, and learning. In fact, more than 51 million school hours are lost annually because of dental-related problems.

Tooth decay is largely *preventable, making it all the more important that children have access to proper dental care and the resources to develop healthy dental habits. But for every child without medical insurance in the United States, there are 2.6 who lack dental insurance. Many are working to improve access to pediatric dental care, whether through legislation or on-the-ground donation of time and resources. NCL issued a letter last summer with several other organizations urging Congress to cover oral health within the large health reform bill.

You can get involved by putting your dental care skills to the *test. *Click here for more facts about children’s oral health. And visit this site if you need help finding a dentist.

*Links are no longer active as the original sources have removed the content, sometimes due to federal website changes or restructurings

Advocates looking for improved Child Nutrition Reauthorization in 2010 – National Consumers League

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Part three of a four-part series, in which we present the food issues we anticipate will affect American consumers the most in 2010.

By Courtney Brein, Linda Golodner Food Safety and Nutrition Fellow

The Child Nutrition Act comes up for reauthorization every five years. The legislation, which covers all federal child nutrition programs (a group that includes the National School Lunch Program, the School Breakfast Program, the Child and Adult Care Food Program, the Summer Food Services Program, the After School Snack and Meal Program, and WIC) is permanently authorized, but the periodic reauthorization allows Congress to make changes where needed. The Act came up for reauthorization on September 30, 2009, but, in light of more pressing issues on the table, Congress voted to extend the current school food program, with only minor modifications (such as additional funding for summer meals, infrastructure, and automatic enrollment) for one year, postponing the process to 2010.

As a member of the National Alliance for Nutrition & Activity, the National Consumers League supports a series of reauthorization recommendations for improving the nutritional quality of food both served to and chosen by children. Priority lists put forth by the American Public Health Association (APHA) and the Food Research and Action Center (FRAC) contain additional, important suggestions for improving the diets of the nation’s youngest generation, both now and in the future.

Consumers both young and old benefit from improvements to the federal child nutrition programs. Students eating breakfast and lunch at school and over the summer; children and elderly adults eating meals and snacks in day care; and pregnant women, breastfeeding women, and young children participating in the WIC program all directly benefit from nutritional improvements, nutrition education, and increased access to food. As previously mentioned, NAHO and others report research findings that adequate, nutritious food plays a fundamental role in a child’s physical, cognitive, academic, emotional, and social development, and childhood hunger impedes individuals’ ability to compete in today’s workforce, while increasing their health costs. Passing meaningful Child Nutrition Reauthorization in 2010 will not only improve the quality of school foods, accessibility to healthier foods, and understanding of healthy choices, but will help to chip away at childhood hunger and improve the health and competitiveness of our nation’s citizens.

A Valentine to Florence Kelley – National Consumers League

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By Sally Greenberg, NCL Executive Director

Friday’s Washington Post featured a story about the recession sending more women into the workplace, many returning to work after spending years at home with their kids. In 2008, the first year of the recession, employed wives contributed 45 percent of the household income, a high for the decade.

Experts think that the unemployment rate for men is higher at 10 percent because industries that are male-dominated, like construction and manufacturing, have been hit hardest in the economic downturn. Health care and education industries tend to be women-dominated, and in many cases they have actually added jobs, opening doors to women’s return to work. The women quoted in this article talk about how “hectic” life becomes once they go back to work, how getting home in the evening means daycare pickup, homework, dinner, and bedtime.

I find all of this really interesting when viewed through the lens of history. I’m currently reading the fascinating new publication, “The Selected Letters of Florence Kelley, 1869-19311” the National Consumers League’s first General Secretary. Kelley – who, from the very first day of NCL’s founding in 1899, fought valiantly for basic rights and protections of women that many of us take for granted today. Kelley worked for the right of women to earn minimum wage and not be forced to work more than 10 hours per day, six days a week (a protection upheld in the 1908 Supreme Court case of Muller v. Oregon).

When NCL was founded, millions of women in the United States went to work each day in factories, bakeries, mills, hospitals, or laundries in the near-dawn hours – or started work at night – and never knew when they would return home. Their employers controlled how long they worked and what they would get paid. And no one got paid overtime. To make matters worse, women often worked for pauper’s wages, while being exposed to dangerous working conditions, including exposure to chemicals, repetitive movements, poor ventilation, or dangerous machinery.

The worst thing the women quoted in Friday’s Washington Post article complain of are hectic nights now that they aren’t at home during the day with their children. Of course, many less fortunate women in this country still face sweatshop working conditions, low wages, and even “wage-theft” where they put in hours that their employers don’t pay them for. And NCL continues to support efforts to improve their lot.

But for millions of working women, conditions have improved enormously. On this Valentine’s Day, we owe a debt of thanks to Florence Kelley and the many women and men of the National Consumers League who fought in the courts, in the state legislatures, and in Congress to provide millions of women far better working conditions today

The working poor lose a great friend and advocate – National Consumers League

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By Sally Greenberg, NCL Executive Director

On Tuesday I attended the funeral of Beth Shulman, a Washington, DC-based labor leader and a champion of the working poor. I didn’t know her well; I had met her a few times at various events, most recently at the Retirement USA conference in October. Shortly after the conference, she was diagnosed with brain cancer. As I listened to the eulogies at the funeral this week, I had a feeling of deep regret that I hadn’t taken the time to get to know Shulman better, for her life’s work — advocating for low-wage workers, including working for minimum wages, paid sick days, and paid family leave — closely tracks the work of NCL.

Shulman was a vice president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union and in 2003 wrote the book, “The Betrayal of Work: How Low-Wage Jobs Fail 30 Million Americans,” arguing that society pays scant attention to the people upon whom it depends every day.

She was a sought-after guest on news and talk shows, including The Oprah Winfrey Show, PBS NewsHour, CNN, ABC’s World News Tonight, and National Public Radio. Like Florence Kelley, NCL’s first inspirational leader, she kept the drumbeat going on behalf of the working poor.

In a Washington Post op-ed in 2004, she wrote:

If work does not work for millions of Americans, it undermines our most fundamental ideal: that if you work hard, you can support yourself and your family. …Consigning millions of Americans to dead-end, low-wage jobs endangers the notion of equal opportunity. A key to turning this around is understanding what made ‘good jobs’ good. There is nothing inherent in welding bumpers onto cars or manufacturing steel girders that makes those better jobs than caring for children or guarding office buildings. Workers organizing through unions, and the passage of social legislation, raised wages and created paid leave and retirement benefits in these initially ‘bad’ manufacturing jobs, changing them into good middle-class positions.

Shulman became assistant general counsel at the UFCW, which has a seat on the NCL Board of Directors, in 1976 and worked for the union until 2000, with her last 13 years there as international vice president and executive board member for the 1.4 million-member organization.

Like Florence Kelley, Shulman was a prolific writer and advocate. She traveled the country speaking, serving on boards and committees dedicated to improving the lives of the lowest paid workers in America and calling upon Americans to recognize the dignity of their work and how dependent we all are on workers who earn low wages and receive few, if any, benefits. Tragically, Shulman leaves an 11-year-old-son and grieving husband. They should both know that her contributions will not be forgotten and that she inspired many young people to work in the labor movement. I feel sure Shulman would have felt right at home with Florence Kelley and her progeny at the NCL. If America had more Beth Shulmans, we might finally provide decent wages and benefits to our working poor and treat them with far more dignity and respect. Now that’s a goal to work toward.

CBS investigates antibiotic use in livestock – National Consumers League

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by Courtney Brein, Linda Golodner Food Safety and Nutrition Fellow

For the last two evenings, Katie Couric has presented a special *CBS news investigation into the use of antibiotics in factory farms. For decades, farms around the country have routinely added antibiotics to animal feed, in order to cause animals to grow more quickly and to keep disease from rapidly spreading in the confinement pens that characterize factory farming.

The CBS investigation segment began with a focus on a group of farm workers who have experienced repeated cases of methicillin-resistant staph (MRSA), due to their jobs handling poultry. Unfortunately, these workers are not the exception – and poultry not the only problematic farmed animal. CBS referenced a University of Iowa study conducted last year, which found a new strain of MRSA in 70 percent of hogs and 64 percent of farm workers on antibiotic-using farms in Iowa and Western Illinois. These numbers present a stark contrast to antibiotic-free farms, where researchers did not find MRSA in any hogs or workers.

These findings present a problem, not only for farm workers, but for the broader population. Health officials at the FDA and elsewhere have started to express concern that overuse of antibiotics in factory farming will contribute to antibiotic-resistant infections, a rapidly increasing problem in the United States.

While watchdog groups have long called for an end to the use of antibiotics in factory farming, no government action has been taken on the issue, as of yet. The FDA, however, intends to change that, according to Joshua Sharfstein, FDA deputy director.

“We want to put in place measures to reduce inappropriate use and we want to see that those are working – in order to do that we have to have a good surveillance system,” Sharfstein told CBS’ Couric. “There’s no question that needs to be improved.”

Not everyone agrees that American factory farms overuse antibiotics. Liz Wagstrom, a veterinarian with the National Pork Board, told Couric that she believes that the majority of pork producers use antibiotics appropriately. Other beef and pork industry groups, such as the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, have also made statements about the need for the current antibiotic use in factory farming.

One thing seems certain: this issue will not be resolved anytime soon. Interested consumers should stay tuned as the battle over antibiotics in American meat heats up, and those who are concerned about consuming antibiotic-tainted meat should look for the statements “no antibiotics administered” or “raised without antibiotics” on packaging at the grocery store.

*Links are no longer active as the original sources have removed the content, sometimes due to federal website changes or restructurings.