RFK Jr.’s new dietary guidelines end ‘the war on saturated fats’ : Shots

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has announced new dietary guidelines for Americans focused on promoting whole foods, proteins and healthy fats.

At a press conference Wednesday, the administration unveiled a new food pyramid with red meat, cheese, vegetables and fruits pictured at the top.

Kennedy described the guidelines as the most significant reset on nutrition policy in history, calling for an end to policies that promote highly refined foods that are harmful to health.

The guidelines will set limits on added sugar and encourage diets that include meat and dairy.

“Protein and healthy fats are essential and were wrongly discouraged in prior dietary guidelines,” Kennedy said. “We are ending the war on saturated fats.”

And they called for a “dramatic reduction” in the consumption of “highly processed foods laden with refined carbohydrates, added sugars, excess sodium, unhealthy fats, and chemical additives.”

In an introduction to the new guidelines, Kennedy and Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said, “we are reclaiming the food pyramid and returning it to its true purpose of educating and nourishing all Americans.”

The new food pyramid replaces the ‘my plate’ icon and turns the old pyramid on its head.

U.S. Department of Agriculture/U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

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U.S. Department of Agriculture/U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

A food pyramid, which was narrow on the top and wide at the bottom, was introduced in the early 90s. Grains were at the bottom — a signal to eat plenty of them, and oils and fats were at the top, a signal to eat them sparingly. The USDA retired the entire pyramid concept in June 2011, replacing it with the simpler ‘MyPlate’ visual, introduced by First Lady Michelle Obama. Now, the plate has been retired, and the pyramid has made a come-back — but this time it’s turned upside down.

“This approach can change the health trajectory for so many Americans,” Kennedy and Rollins wrote, pointing out that more than 70% of American adults are overweight or obese due to a diet that has “become reliant on highly processed foods and coupled with a sedentary lifestyle.”

For years, Americans have been advised to limit saturated fat, and the new pyramid is facing criticism.

“I’m very disappointed in the new pyramid that features red meat and saturated fat sources at the very top, as if that’s something to prioritize. It does go against decades and decades of evidence and research,” says Christopher Gardner, a nutrition expert at Stanford University. He was a member of the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee, which reviewed all the nutrition evidence. He’s in favor of increasing plant-based sources of protein, such as beans, rather than emphasizing animal protein.

Both the American Heart Association and the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, which includes thousands of nutrition professionals, point to evidence that excess saturated fat is linked to heart disease. And the new guidelines do still include a long held recommendation to limit saturated fat to 10% of your daily calories.

The guidelines also elevate cheese and other dairy to the top of the pyramid, paving the way for the option of full-fat milk and other dairy products in school meals. There’s growing evidence, based on nutrition science, that dairy foods can be beneficial.

“It’s pretty clear that overall milk and cheese and yogurt can be part of a healthy diet,” says Dariush Mozaffarian, a cardiologist, a public health scientist and the director of the Food is Medicine Institute at Tufts University. “Both low-fat and whole-fat dairy versions of milk, cheese and yogurt have been linked to lower cardiovascular risk,” he says.

“What’s quite interesting is that the fat content doesn’t seem to make a big difference,” Mozaffarian says.

And while whole grains are pictured at the smallest point at the bottom of the new pyramid, the guidelines instruct Americans to “prioritize fiber-rich whole grains.” There’s now a sharp distinction between whole grains and refined grains. The guidelines recommend two to four servings per day of whole grains, while significantly reducing the consumption of highly processed, refined carbohydrates, such as white bread, ready-to-eat or packaged foods.

Mozaffarian says he supports the recommendations to lower consumption of highly processed foods. “Highly processed foods are clearly harmful for a range of diseases, so to have the U.S. government recommend that a wide class of foods be eaten less because of their processing is a big deal and I think a very positive move for public health,” he says.

While the guidelines do not use the word ultra-processed, they do stress that Americans should eat, “real food that nourishes the body.” And they recommend no amount of added sugar for children under the age of 10.

The new guidelines also include changes to alcohol recommendations, removing specific daily limits, previously up to one drink a day for women and two for men. Instead, the guidelines simply state: “Consume less alcohol for better health” — without specifying any amounts.

In addition, the guidelines lists who should completely avoid alcohol including pregnant women, people recovering from alcohol use disorder and those who are unable to control the amount they drink, and people taking medications or with medical conditions that can interact with alcohol.

Though most Americans don’t read the dietary guidelines, they are highly influential in determining what’s served in school meals and on military bases, as well as what’s included in federal food aid for mothers and infants, as the guidelines set targets for calories and nutrients.