Health Experts Call for Coke Snub
Citing Coca-Cola's agressive marketing of nutritionally deficient beverages to children, more than 40 health care professionals and children's advocates signed a letter to the pension giant TIAA-CREF, asking it to remove the Coca-Cola Co. from CREF's Social Choice Account.
"A company that undermines the health of children through the aggressive marketing of nutritionally deficient products is not a social choice," stated the letter, which was written by the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood (CCFC) and signed by such experts as Marion Nestle, author of Food Politics; Margo Wootan of the Center for Science in the Public Interest; Susan Linn, author of Consuming Kids: The Hostile Takeover of Childhood; and Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation.
The letter points to the growing body of evidence that soft drinks are contributing to health problems for children and the details the ways in which Coke regularly violates its own policy to “not aim or direct any marketing activity from any source to children under the age of 12.”
Kudos, as usual, to the Campaign for Commercial Free Childhood for organizing this important effort to boost people's awareness about the dangers of empty-calorie, nutrient-lacking Coke.
To get involved with the group, check out its "7 Things You Can Do to Fight Back Against Predatory Marketers."
Posted by: Aaron Miller | Monday, December 05, 2005 at 06:36 AM