Less than 10 per cent of calories for adults should come from added sugars put in packaged foods and sodas, and also less than 10 per cent from saturated fats, according to the new guidelines from the departments of Agriculture and Health and Human Services. Despite an advisory committee report released in February 2015 that was supposed to inform the recommendations and cited scientific evidence that healthy diets were “lower in red and processed meat” in order to avoid cardiovascular disease, obesity and other diseases, the dietary guidelines abandoned those findings.
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The guidelines also aren’t as harsh on processed and red meat as an earlier panel that suggested a very strong link between those types of meats and cancer.
Additionally, the guidelines recommend that sodium intake should be less than 2,300 mgs per day for those aged 14 years and older, and even less for children and adolescents younger 14 years of age.
The new dietary guidelines urges Americans to reduce intake of sugar and trans and saturated fats. The average American consumes 3,400 milligrams of salt per day, “an excessive amount”, SF Gate reports, “that raises blood pressure and poses health risks”. For the most part, the USDA guidelines stick to the script of healthy eating.
The new guidelines are rewritten every five years, and obviously not everyone will agree with all of the recommendations, but the dietary standards are all based on sound science, according to Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell. Updated every five years, the government recommendations have been credited – or blamed (depending on whom you ask) – for shaping the eating habits of generations of Americans.
“Sometimes it’s hard for us to really calculate what that means”, Trombetta said, so she laid it out: On a 2,000-calorie diet, all it takes is 20-ounce, non-diet soda – which can contain 65 grams of sugar – to blast that daily limit. “One of the things we are steering people to is small changes”.
They also offer familiar suggestions, like increasing intake of vegetables and whole grains.
Alcohol consumption should be moderate – one drink per day for women and two for men. Several more recent studies have shown little relationship between heart disease and dietary cholesterol, focusing more on the kinds of fats consumed.
“Health care professionals can help individuals identify how they can modify and improve their dietary patterns and intake to align with the Dietary Guidelines”.
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“It’s clear to me and my colleagues that the administration wisely listened to the science and dismissed the interests of political activists”, said Alabama Rep. Robert Aderholt, the Republican chairman of the subcommittee that oversees Agriculture Department spending.
