Health and Human Services and the U-S Department of Agriculture released new dietary guidelines this week to encourage healthy eating habits to reduce obesity and prevent chronic diseases.
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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.
Apart from the recommended cutback on sugar, the guidelines also linked health benefits to as many as five cups of daily consumption of coffee such lowered risk of cardiovascular diseases and Type 2 Diabetes.
The guidelines reaffirm familiar recommendations such as consuming a variety of vegetables, fruits and whole grains, and shifting to healthier beverage choices.
“By omitting specific diet recommendations, such as eating less red and processed meat, these guidelines miss a critical and significant opportunity to reduce suffering and death from cancer”, Wender said.
Barack Obama’s administration unveiled dietary guidelines on Thursday that urge Americans to limit their sugar intake and call on men and boys to eat less protein but eased previous recommendations on cholesterol and sodium. But the meat industry objected, so instead there is more general encouragement to eat other protein such as seafood and nuts. Bacon and hot dogs can be eaten as long as the total amount of calories consumed fall under the government guidelines.
The recommendations also said Americans should limit their daily caloric intake of sugars to 10 percent, a first. In the USA, people consume up to 3,400 milligrams of sodium per day, an amount that can result in high blood pressure, according to Burwell.
One of the most significant changes is the removal of a daily recommended limit for cholesterol.
Added sugars are not the same thing as natural sugars found in things like fruit or milk. The guidelines previously had advised people to consume less than 300 mg of cholesterol in their diet per day but to “eat as little dietary cholesterol as possible” while building a healthy diet.
One big change included in the guidelines: Americans are being told to cut down on their sugar intake.
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Recommendations on meat consumption were contentious among health and environmental experts who say the government is ignoring science in favor of listening to industry. They affect the foods chosen for the school lunch program, which feeds more than 30 million children each school day, and they help shape national food assistance programs like the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, which has 8 million beneficiaries.
