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How much sugar should you really allow your kids?

For kids, Easter morning means one thing — a big basket of candy. It’s a part of many childhoods — the egg dying, wearing your Sunday best, and biting ears-first into a giant chocolate rabbit. You try to limit your kid to just a few handfuls of jelly beans, but you turn your back for five minutes and they’ve devoured enough candy to fuel their whole year. While the candy-coma isn’t an actual medical condition, an excess of sugar and sweets can definitely take a toll on your child’s health. According to the American Heart Association (AHA), children shouldn’t have more than 3-6 teaspoons (12-25 grams) of added sugar per day. Eating too much sugar can actually make us crave more sugar, which can ultimately lead to everything from cavities, to obesity, and heart disease. In line with the AHA, the World Health Organization recommends that “free sugars” (sugars from…

Report shows restaurants that use most antibiotics in meats

Consumers Union has released its third annual “Chain Reaction” report on the prevalence of antibiotics in meat products in America’s most popular chain restaurants. Sadly, the results show most of the restaurants have failed to improve, even in the face of drug-resistant superbugs. The rankings are based on each companies’ own policies for the use of antibiotic in meat and poultry products that they buy. Pumping chickens, cows and pigs full of antibiotics intended for humans is slowly destroying our ability to treat common infections. The U.N. has called it a growing concern and potential global health crisis. More than 23,000 people die annually in the U.S. from antibiotic-resistant infections each year, according the the CDC. To combat this problem, doctors and hospitals use antibiotics more judiciously than in the past, yet 70 percent of all antibiotics sold in the U.S. aren’t intended for human use anyway, but rather in animal agriculture. “The nation’s fast food restaurant chains are…