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June 11, 2012, The New York Times, Winnie Hu
A hospital offers Zumba and cooking classes. Farmers markets dole out $2 coupons for cantaloupe and broccoli. An adopt-a-bodega program nudges store owners to stock low-fat milk. And one apartment building even slowed down its elevator, and lined its stairwells with artwork, to entice occupants into some daily exercise.
In the Bronx, where more than two-thirds of adults are overweight, the message has been unmistakably clear for a long time: Slim down now.
But, if anything, this battery of efforts points to how intractable …

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TweetApril 30, 2012, China Millman, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Buzzword: High-fructose corn syrup
The Mystery: Is high-fructose corn syrup responsible for the obesity epidemic, or isn’t it? Is it worse for us to eat than sugar? Should we avoid it in the grocery store or is it really just the same as sugar?
The Expert: Frank Hu, M.D., Ph.D., professor of nutrition and epidemiology at the Harvard School of Public Health, professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and Channing Lab and Brigham and Women’s Hospital; and director of the Boston Obesity Nutrition Research Center, …

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TweetSome studies have suggested that diet soda lovers could face higher risks of diabetes and heart disease, but one recent U.S. study of several diet drink consumers found that overall eating habits may be what matters most in the end.
Researchers, whose findings were published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, used data on more than 4,000 people taking part in a long-term study of heart health and followed them for the next 20 years.
Of the study participants between the ages of 18 and 30 when it began in the …

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TweetHealthDay, November 1, 2011
A new report claims that the makers of sugar-laden drinks such as sodas, sports drinks, energy drinks and fruit drinks take direct aim at children, particularly black and Hispanic kids, in their marketing campaigns.
Read the report at: Report slams makers of sugary drinks for targeting kids – USATODAY.com.

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TweetSeptember 14, Philly.com, Karen Heller
The offer from Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia to fund an antiobesity program, financed by the soda industry, just fizzled like so many flat colas.
We have a monstrous obesity problem, and Philadelphia could use the money. But saying no was the obvious choice for the Nutter administration, waging a campaign for healthier diets.
The choice was also right.
“It seems to me that accepting money from the beverage industry to fight obesity would be like taking money from the NRA to fight gun violence or from the tobacco industry …

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TweetSeptember 12, 2011,  CMJ
Health organizations are comparing their battle with makers of sugary beverages to the war they once waged with big tobacco. Advocates for healthy living have run educational campaigns and called for marketing regulations and taxes on high-calorie drinks. The beverage industry, meanwhile, has accused some health departments of launching baseless attacks and has even responded in one jurisdiction with a lawsuit.
Health departments in a number of areas — including Chicago, Illinois; Seattle, Washington; and Chatham-Kent, Ontario — have launched public health campaigns that expose the high-calorie count …

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TweetSeptember 6, 2011, Boston Globe, Kay Lazar
Hoping to blunt the pervasive reach of sugary drinks, Boston officials today unveiled a public awareness campaign that urges residents to reduce their consumption of the beverages , which public health specialists link to rising obesity rates and higher health care costs.
The campaign, which will include a media blitz of the city, comes a month before an executive order by Mayor Thomas M. Menino takes effect, phasing out the sale, advertising, and promotion of sugar-sweetened beverages in all municipal buildings.
“We are in the midst …

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TweetAugust 30, 2011, CBS News, David Freeman
Has the time come for school districts across the nation to just say no to sugary drinks?
That’s what some experts are saying in light of new research suggesting that Boston’s controversial ban on sugar-sweetened beverages has succeeded in limiting kids’ consumption of soft drinks and sports beverages – which have been identified as major contributors to the nation’s epidemic of childhood obesity.
A study published in the CDC journal Preventing Chronic Disease shows that high-school students in the city averaged 1.38 servings of sugar-sweetened beverage …

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TweetAugust 31, 2011, USA Today, Nancy Hellmich
Teens who drink soda, energy drinks and other sugary beverages are guzzling about 327 calories a day from them, which is equal to about 2½ cans of cola, new government data shows.
And people ages 20-39 who drink sugary beverages consume 336 calories a day from them.
Some people are getting a lot of their daily calories from these drinks, says Cynthia Ogden, an epidemiologist with the National Center for Health Statistics, part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which conducted this survey.
The latest …

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TweetJuly 28, 2011, Reuters
Americans downed nearly a quarter less added sugar in 2008 than they did nine years earlier, a new report concludes.
The drop is largely due to a decrease in the amount of sugar-sweetened soda that people drank.
“We were surprised to see that there was a substantial reduction over the years,” said Dr. Jean Welsh, a researcher at Emory University in Atlanta and the lead author of the report.
Although the reasons for the dip are still murky, she said a big push by the government and private organizations to …