Boston supplier recalls fresh tuna steaks; Big Y among affected stores

BOSTON (AP) - A Boston-based seafood supplier is recalling fresh tuna steaks distributed in New England because of high levels of histamine, a potentially harmful chemical that can develop naturally in poorly stored fish.

North Coast Seafood said in a statement released late Tuesday it was recalling the fish after three reports of illness.

Smoke-quit drugs get top warning

NEW YORK (AP) - The Food and Drug Administration will require two smoking-cessation drugs, Chantix and Zyban, to carry the agency's strongest safety warning over side effects including depression and suicidal thoughts.

Obama urges public to push health reform

WASHINGTON - With lawmakers on Capitol Hill struggling to pull together sweeping health-care legislation, President Barack Obama Wednesday called for increased public pressure on Congress, warning that some lawmakers might be tempted to put off action.

FDA panel: Remove Vicodin, Percocet

ADELPHI, Md. - Government experts say prescription drugs like Vicodin and Percocet that combine a popular painkiller with stronger narcotics should be eliminated because of their role in deadly overdoses.

A Food and Drug Administration panel on Tuesday voted 20-17 that prescription drugs that combine acetaminophen with other painkilling ingredients should be pulled off the market.

Dairy debate: Myriad milk choices = consumer conundrum

Patty Sullivan is stumped by the dairy case. One kind of milk promises to make her children smarter. Another claims to come from healthier cows. Unable to sort all that out, she reaches for conventional Costco milk. Not long ago, consumers had to ponder only one thing before hefting a gallon jug into the shopping cart: How much fat did they want? Then, more than a decade ago, organic started showing up in traditional supermarkets. Today, the world of milk is even more rarefied - and more confusing, because the milk trucks are moving more quickly than the science.

Deciphering the dairy case

 · Conventional: Milk comes from cows that might have been treated with antibiotics and injected with synthetic growth hormone. The animals also may eat feed treated with chemical pesticides.

Do you know how healthy you really are? Fat chance

By Lenny Bernstein The Washington Post

I've never paid much attention to the number salad of statistics that experts use to measure fitness. For one thing, I'm convinced that "body mass index" and its ilk were devised by the same people who predict how much money I'll need in retirement: In both cases, it's just too depressing to do the math.