Free Republic

According to a new report by the Institute for Medicine, the proposed “symbol system should show calories in household servings on all products.” The report goes on to recommend that “[f]oods and beverages should be evaluated using a point system for saturated and trans fats and sodium, and added sugars.” It concludes that “healthier” foods would have a higher number of points than less healthy products. The report compares the healthy-symbol plan to the EPA’s “EnergyStar” label, which dates to the early 1990s and is supposed to prod consumers to buy energy-efficient appliances and electronic devices. Although generally ignored by...

Telling consumers where their meat, fruit and vegetables came from seemed such a good idea to U.S. ranchers and farmers in competition with imports that Congress two years ago ordered the food industry to do it. But meatpackers and food processors fought the law from the start, and newly emboldened Republicans now plan to repeal it before Thanksgiving. As part of the 2002 farm bill, country-of-origin labeling was supposed to have gone into effect this fall. Congress last year postponed it until 2006. Now, House Republicans are trying to wipe it off the books as part of a spending bill...

When you see the American Heart Association's "heart healthy" label, you have some additional, helpful information about the product you're buying. That seems simple and obvious. But European bureaucrats have decided that their subjects are too stupid to handle such information. New rules governing food labels in Europe, would "put an end to endorsements by doctors or other health experts, because they might suggest that not eating the specified food could lead to health problems" (emphasis ours). Thankfully, the U.S. is going in the opposite direction. The FDA will allow "qualified health claims" on more products -- a move that,...