The USDA has lowered the recommended safe cooking temperature for whole cuts of pork from 160 to 145 degrees F and added a three-minute rest, saying properly cooked pork may still look pink. Beef, veal and lamb stay at 145 F; ground meats stay at 160 F and poultry at 165 F.
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Page 51 of 63
Politics
Food law, regulation, government advisories and the legal fights over what reaches your plate.
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Advisories
USDA Food Safety Tips for Areas Affected by Recent Spate of Tornadoes
USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service issued food safety guidance for tornado-hit areas of the Southeast and Midwest: keep appliance thermometers in the fridge and freezer, freeze water and gel packs, group frozen food together, and line up coolers and ice before the power goes out.
Politics
USDA may give consumers less information on pesticides in produce (PR)
The Environmental Working Group delivered nearly 55,000 signatures to Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, arguing pesticide and agribusiness interests are pressing the USDA to downplay risks in its coming produce residue data. EWG says tax money funded an industry campaign.
Politics
Testing fresh produce for pesticide residues
EWG asks readers to sign a petition urging USDA not to scale back the pesticide residue data it has published since 1991, the basis for EWG's Shopper's Guide, after an industry campaign to alter the results, including a taxpayer-funded effort by the Alliance for Food and Farming.
Politics
Tell President Obama & Secretary Vilsack to halt the planting of Monsanto's GMO alfalfa and sugar beets (PR)
Food Democracy Now! asks readers to sign a letter urging President Obama and Secretary Vilsack to halt Roundup Ready alfalfa and sugar beets, citing plant pathologist Don Huber's warning about a new organism linked to crop disease and livestock infertility.
Politics
Sign the Safe Cosmetics petition! (PR)
EWG Action Fund is urging readers to sign a petition pressing Congress to require safety testing of personal care products. It says the industry's own review panel has not evaluated more than half of the ingredients in use, and that 22 percent of products may contain 1,4-dioxane.
Politics
Chocolate milk in the lunchroom
Los Angeles Unified's superintendent plans to push this summer to drop chocolate and strawberry milk from school menus, noting an 8-ounce serving carries nearly the calories and sugar of a 12-ounce Coke. USDA has also raised school meal nutrition standards.
Law & Regulations
Food Bill Aims to Improve Safety - FDA
The Food Safety Modernization Act, signed January 4, requires food companies to write preventive-control plans, gives FDA better authority to require recalls, and strengthens oversight of imported food. CDC data show one in six Americans suffers a foodborne illness each year.
Politics
Doctors Urge Congress to Shut Down Federal Programs Providing Subsidies for Unhealthy Foods (PR)
The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine reports that 63 percent of federal agricultural subsidies go to meat and dairy while fruits and vegetables get under 1 percent. Neal Barnard has written to the House and Senate agriculture chairs urging cuts before the Farm Bill review.
Politics
Agricultural Subsidies Tax our Health
A doctor's op-ed argues federal farm subsidies, about $16 billion a year, mostly back the foods the USDA tells Americans to eat less of. Hog producers saved 15 percent on operating costs from subsidized feed grain, dairy drew $4.8 billion from 1995 to 2009, and produce got under 1 percent.
Politics
Unhealthy food ads that target kids
The government asked food companies to voluntarily limit advertising aimed at children 2 to 17 to foods low in fat, sugar and sodium. Yale's Rudd Center found preschoolers see 2.8 fast-food TV ads a day and older teens 4.7, and McDonald's 13 sites draw 365,000 child visitors a year.
Politics
EPA sacrifices science to protect fluoridation (PR)
With 41% of US children aged 12 to 15 showing dental fluorosis, HHS proposed lowering the fluoridation level to 0.7 ppm while EPA released documents underpinning a new drinking-water goal. The writer argues EPA abandoned the science behind its safe reference dose.
Politics
Largest Organic Milk Bottler Accused of Misrepresenting Products (PR)
The Cornucopia Institute asked the Federal Trade Commission to investigate Dean Foods' advertising for Horizon milk with added DHA. It argues the claim that the algae-derived oil supports brain health rests on little scientific evidence and misleads consumers.
Politics
Lunches from home banned in public school
Little Village Academy, a Chicago public school, bars pupils from bringing lunch from home unless they have a medical allergy, requiring all to buy the school's hot lunch. The principal says it protects children from poor food choices; critics raise cost, parental control and waste.
Politics
Alfalfa Plan B
An organizer answers USDA's approval of genetically modified alfalfa, along with its moves on GM sugar beets and ethanol corn, arguing that the millions now voicing anger mark real progress and an opening to press harder.
Politics
Please Stop Dangerous Attacks on ALL Independent GMO Researchers
Jeffrey Smith's submission to the French courts supporting Professor Seralini argues that denial, distortion and harassment of independent GMO researchers have been institutionalized, citing Nature on partisan attacks and Ignacio Chapela's account of being denigrated by Monsanto's PR firm.
Politics
Stop the Corporate Takeover of Organics (PR)
The Cornucopia Institute urges readers to comment to the National Organic Standards Board against a proposal that would let any synthetic additive qualifying as a nutrient be added to organic food without the individual petition and review organic law now requires.
Politics
Food, EPA, and Water - EWG newsletter
An EWG newsletter rounding up its 2011 work: a TEDxManhattan talk on turning the farm bill into a food bill, pressure on Congress not to cut nutrition programs while leaving agribusiness subsidies intact, and a finding that 23 members of Congress or their relatives collect farm subsidies.
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