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Americans should eat more beans, peas and lentils and cut back on red and processed meats and starchy vegetables, as well as continue to limit added sugars, sodium and saturated fats. The advice comes Tuesday from a panel of nutrition experts charged with advising the U.S. government on a 2025 version of the dietary guidelines that will form the cornerstone of federal food programs and policy.
But the 20-member panel did not note the growing role of ultraprocessed foods in links to health problems and said there is not enough evidence to tell people to avoid them. And the group refrained from updating controversial guidance on alcohol consumption, leaving that analysis to two outside reports expected to be released soon.
Overall, the recommendations in the 2025-2030 Dietary Guidelines for Americans sound familiar, said food policy expert Marion Nestle. “It looks like every other set of dietary guidelines since the 1980s: Eat your vegetables and reduce your intake of foods high in salt, sugar and saturated fat,” Nestle said in an email. “This particular statement says nothing about balancing calories when overconsumption of calories, especially from ultra-processed foods, is the biggest challenge to Americans’ health.”
What did the scientific panel say about healthy diets?
The nutrition panel concluded that a healthy diet for people ages 2 and older includes vegetables, fruits, legumes, nuts, whole grains, fish and vegetable oils that are high in unsaturated fats. It is low in red and processed meats, sugar-sweetened foods and beverages, refined grains and saturated fats. This may also include fat-free or low-fat dairy and low-sodium foods and plant-based foods.
The panel, which ran for about two years, was the first to focus on Americans’ dietary needs through what she called a “health equity lens,” said Dr. Fatima Cody Stanford, an obesity expert at Massachusetts General Hospital who was part of it. Were. Group. This meant considering factors such as household income, race, ethnicity, and culture when recommending a healthy diet. This will help ensure that the guidance “reflects and includes diverse population groups,” he said in an email.
The panel did not reach conclusions on ultraprocessed foods or alcohol. Ultraprocessed foods include snacks, sugary cereals, and frozen meals that make up about 60% of the American diet. The panel considered more than 40 studies, many of which showed an association between ultraprocessed foods and being overweight or developing obesity. But nutrition experts had concerns about the quality of the research, leading them to conclude that the evidence was too limited to make recommendations.
The decision is likely to run counter to the views of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., the nominee to lead the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, who has raised questions about potential conflicts of interest among members of the Dietary Guidelines Panel and sought to put a stop to it. Have sworn. On ultraprocessed foods that contribute to chronic disease. The panel also did not modify recommendations that suggest limiting alcohol intake to two drinks or less a day for men and one drink or less a day for women.
In 2020, the last time the guidance was updated, the government rejected advice from scientific advisers to recommend less alcohol consumption. The two groups — a committee from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine and the government agency that oversees substance abuse — are expected to issue reports in the coming months on the effects of moderate alcohol use to inform guidelines. .
Do Americans follow the Dietary Guidelines?
The advisory panel acknowledged that the diets of most Americans do not meet current guidelines. According to the report, more than half of U.S. adults have one or more diet-related chronic health conditions and 18 million American households have insecure sources of food.
“Nutrition-related chronic health conditions and their precursors remain threats to health across the lifespan,” the report concludes. “Which does not bode well for the future of health in the United States.”
what happens next?
Scientific reports inform dietary guidelines, which are updated every five years. Tuesday’s recommendations will now go to HHS and the Agriculture Department, where officials will draft a final guidance set for release next year. Starting Wednesday, the public will have 60 days to comment on the guidance. HHS and USDA officials will hold a public meeting on Jan. 16 to discuss the recommendations.
Dr. Peter Lurie, president of the advocacy group Center for Science in the Public Interest, said the new guidance, which will be finalized by the incoming Trump administration, is consistent with decades of federal efforts to reduce diet-related disease in the US. “Broadly speaking, I think these are well-crafted recommendations that the incoming administration would do well to adopt,” Lurie said.
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