In a Page One story yesterday, The New York Times reported on Michelle Obama’s attempts to coax the American restaurant industry in the direction of preparing healthier offerings for children. This is part of her Let’s Move campaign against childhood obesity. The Times notes that meetings between Mrs.

The March issue of Pediatrics presents some startling if unexplained findings about infant health. Researchers who conducted a study of 847 babies in eastern Massachusetts found that there was a 6.3 fold increase in the likelihood that a child would be obese at age three if a bottle-fed infant began eating solid foods before four months of age compared to bottle-fed infants who began eating solid foods after four months.

There is no such thing as a safe form of tobacco, says Joseph Lee, a social research specialist for the Department of Family Medicine at University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, in an op-ed last week for Raleigh’s NewsObserver.com.

Cancer is the leading cause of death worldwide. At least that’s what the World Cancer Research Fund (WCRF) would have you believe in its report Global Recommendations on Physical Activity for Health, supported by the World Health Organization (WHO).

Under its accelerated approval program, the FDA announced Friday that it has given the go-ahead to K-V Pharmaceutical Co.’s new drug Makena, a synthetic form of progesterone used to reduce the risk of premature delivery.

ACSH staffers are pleased that USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack has once again ruled on the side of science, this time allowing American farmers to continue growing genetically modified sugar beets. The biotech seeds, which last year accounted for 90 percent of all sugar beets planted in the U.S., were barred from use until an environmental impact statement assessing the effects of the GM crop was completed, according to a federal district court ruling in August.

Parental fears over trace levels of PCBs in New York public schools made the front page of The New York Times today. News of PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) leaking from old light fixtures spread quickly after a pilot study conducted by the EPA last year found that PCB levels in the air in three public schools exceeded federal health limits.

The most popular type of web search is for health information, according to a new study issued by the Pew Internet Project. The report claims that eight out of ten Internet users rely on the web to learn health facts.

VitaminWater advertisements are under attack again, this time by the National Consumers League, for suggesting that the beverage can eliminate the need for flu shots. In a poster ad, consumers are told that flu shots are so last year because VitaminWater s Vitamin C content means more immunity.

City Council member Peter Vallone, Jr. was not happy with ACSH’s recent response to his efforts to ban the fluoridation of New York’s tap water. Ignoring decades of evidence that the addition of fluoride, a substance that protects against cavities, has been one of the most effective public health measures of the century, Mr. Vallone insists that its continued use poses a health risk. Mr.