Federal Dietary Guidelines

The Departments of Agriculture (USDA) and Health and Human Services (HHS) release national dietary guidelines every 5 years. These are the folks that came up with the "food pyramid" idea. Since the last dietary guidelines came out in 2005, new guidelines are on their way. Many people expect the new guidelines to strongly emphasize whole grains, fruits and veggies (obviously), and will recommend only small amounts of meat, if any, to supplement non-animal (leaner) sources of protein.

What I find most interesting is the guidelines have basically been saying the same thing since their inception in 1977. The panel of experts recommended Americans, in particular those overweight, should increase their consumption of complex carbohydrates (whole grains) and "naturally occurring sugars" (fruit and veggies). They should reduce consumption of refined and processed sugars, foods high in total fat and animal fat, and partially replace saturated fats with polyunsaturated fats (effectively, replace ham with olive or canola oil).

So why haven't Americans gotten the message yet? My opinion is they don't want to hear it. They'd rather hear about the new easy miracle diet where all you eat is bacon and steak and you magically lose weight in a healthy fashion. Sure is a lot tastier than broccoli. And it keeps Pfizer, the maker of Lipitor, nicely profitable.