Last week’s headlines included the implications of the U.S. government shutdown for nutrition research, Edinburgh Rugby Union team’s use of an omega-3 smoothie for concussion and recovery, and TikTok clearing nearly 800 sellers making exaggerated weight loss claims.
CDC layoffs put future of public health insights at risk
The latest staff cuts at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention jeopardize future cycles of NHANES, a long-running survey that links diet and health behaviors to major health outcomes affecting millions of Americans.
On Oct. 10, more than a thousand employees at the CDC received reduction-in-force notices, coinciding with the government shutdown that began earlier in the month. The Department of Health and Human Services reinstated 600 staff within 24 hours, citing “data discrepancies and processing errors,” but the planning division responsible for designing and coordinating the National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES) remained furloughed.
“The recent layoffs of the entire Planning Branch within CDC’s Division of Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys threaten future NHANES cycles and the nation’s ability to monitor and understand critical health and nutrition trends,” the American Society for Nutrition (ASN) shared in a statement following the layoffs. “Without them, this foundational resource and the evidence it provides for science, policy and public health are at risk.”
ASN has called on the administration to immediately rescind its notices to the CDC National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) employees, stressing that “NHANES is essential to the nation’s health and nutrition research enterprise.”
Since the Trump administration took office in January, the CDC has lost around 3,000 employees, equivalent to approximately a quarter of its staff.
EO3 teams up with Edinburgh Rugby to tackle concussion through nutrition
Preliminary results show that a specific omega-3 blend reduces total concussions by 28% among professional rugby players in “a real-life setting”.
The professional Edinburgh Rugby Union team used EO3 (Enhanced Omega-3), a Norwegian ready-to-drink fruit and omega-3 smoothie blend, to assess how the product affects concussion severity and recovery time.
The as-of-yet unpublished study results on ‘the ultimate sports recovery drink’ were recently presented at the 2025 Aspetar World Conference on Sports Medicine (Oct. 9-11) in Doha, Qatar.
“We were delighted that a professional team like Edinburgh Rugby wanted to do a solid trial on this important and problematic issue, as we wanted to see in a real, practical setting how EO3 can be beneficial for athletes,” said Janne Karin Sande, inventor of the EO3 sports drink.
The EO3 drink contains sustainable, wild-caught Atlantic cod and offers 20 g of protein and 1,600 mg of omega-3 fatty acids (550 mg of EPA and 820 mg of DHA), as well as vitamins D and E, plus carbohydrates and antioxidants from a range of fruit juices.
TikTok clears nearly 800 sellers making exaggerated weight loss, health claims
Douyin, China’s version of TikTok, has clamped down on merchants promoting their general foods, beverages and supplement products via exaggerated weight loss and other unsupported health claims in a three-month long inspection.
The short-video and livestreaming app said it has cleared 43,000 influencers and 793 sellers that have violated the rules from its platform.
Douyin announced the above on its Douyin E-commerce Security and Trust Center on Monday (Oct 20) and issued the following statement:
“In the past three months, while conducting inspections, the platform found that some merchants and influencers have made used of consumers’ ‘health anxiety’ and repackaged general foods into ‘health products or foods for special medical purposes (FSMP)’, or have exaggerated the use of blue hat health foods to include medical efficacy etc. The platform has since embarked on a special management program to protect consumers’ shopping experience.”
