Archive | Posts Authored by John Serrao

What if this latest peanut-salmonella outbreak in 2009 was completely preventable?  What if the procedures to prevent it were already in place?  Even worse, what if we didn’t even have a food safety system at all? NOTE: This article is the 2nd part of a series about Food Safety in the United States. You may want…

Question: We are having a discussion about whether buttery spread – such as Smart Balance is better than using butter?!?! http://www.smartbalance.com/ what do you think?? Thank you!! Claire from Los Angeles ################## Smart Balance is not good for you in the relative scheme of things.  It is a chemical conglomeration of esterified oils – which…

he early part of 2009 has witnessed one of the largest food contamination cases in US history.  The Peanut Corporation of America had a salmonella outbreak in one of their factories, contaminating the majority of peanut-butter containing products in the United States.  Unfortunately, this outbreak is not an isolated incident across the industry. E.coli O157:H7, Listeria, Staph and…

On Thursday, the US Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions held a hearing called, Integrative Care: A Pathway to a Healthier Nation to assess how complementary medicine will be incorporated into President Obama’s challenge for Congress to pass health care reform in 2009. Barbara Milkulski (D), Maryland and Tom Harkin (D), Iowa chaired the committee that invited a distinguished panel…

In our final view of Truvia and PureVia, we take a look at the political history of stevia – the base of rebiana, opinions of some of the major players in this debate and offer our final views on the subject. NOTE: This article is the 3rd part of a series about Truvia and PureVia. You…

The FDA recently announced that they have cleared a new, zero calorie sweetener called rebaudioside A (rebiana) for sale in the US, calling it ‘safe for use in foods and beverages‘. NOTE: This article is the 2nd part of a series about Truvia and PureVia. You may want to read the first part to better understand this article:…

Credit, Steve 2.0 (flickr) Periodically, readers write into Nutrition Wonderland about issues we cover and we respond back to them.   This is a new column we will try to feature as we move forward – send all questions to [email protected] to be featured in the mailbag. Michelle from Virginia writes: I read with great interest your…

In the coming weeks, we will be examining two new sweeteners called Truvia and PureVia that are being released into the American food supply in the first half of 2009.  They are derivative of a naturally sweet plant called Stevia, which has been used around the world for quite some time now to sweeten drinks and native dishes.   But…

A recent study from the New England Journal of Medicine showed that the death rate from heart disease has fallen by over 50% during the period from 1980-2000.  The authors concluded that the dramatic drop can be equally attributed to medical advancements in treatment and better management of heart disease risk factors, respectively. Cholesterol Myths in…

Actor Jeremy Piven announced yesterday that he will leave the David Mamet play Speed-the-Plow because he has a mercury level running almost six times that of a normal person. Piven complained of fatigue and exhaustion since the play’s opening, which was back in early October. His doctor, Dr. Carlon M. Colker of Peak Wellness in Connecticut, said that all of Mr. Piven’s routine medical…