I made a mistake and did not get this one scheduled correctly.  I’m trying again to get it posted (sigh, my error).

The USDA’s Economic Research Service (what’s left of it) has released its annual report on food assistance, which cost $142 billion in 2024 for all of the 16 programs.

This is a decrease from the $168 billion spent in 2023.

Food assistance accounts for two-thirds of USDA’s budget.

SNAP accounts for 70% of USDA’s food assistance budget.  Its 14% (inflation-adjusted) decline from 2023 “was larger than for any other year on record.”  And that’s before this year’s proposed cuts.

SNAP participation and costs track closely with poverty and food insecurity; when they go up, SNAP goes up.

Comment: The best way to cut SNAP?  Cut poverty.

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Forthcoming November 11, 2025: What To Eat Now

An as yet unpublished evaluation of how well American diets adhere to the dietary guidelines comes to an alarming conclusion: 86.3% are of poor quality.  The study comes from researchers at the University of California San Francisco and Nourish Science.

The study: Understanding Sociodemographic and Dietary Determinants of Cardiometabolic Risk: Cross-Sectional Evidence from the U.S. Healthy Eating Index to Inform Diet Quality Categories.

Methods: The authors used dietary recall data from the 2009-2018 National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys (NHANES) and compared participants’ dietary intakes to the Healthy Eating Index.

Results: Compared to adults with high diet quality, those with very low diet quality consumed:

• Less unprocessed or minimally processed foods, fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and seafood
• More ultra-processed foods, refined grains, and red and processed meats

They also were more likely to be overweight, have lower HDL cholesterol, but higher triglycerides, fasting glucose, and hemoglobin A1c (a marker of type-2 diabetes).

The authors explain their study in an Infographic and a YouTube video.

NHANES collects dietary intake information from representative population samples by interview.

The Healthy Eating Index (HEI) was developed in 1995 as a tool to measure adherence to recommendations of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans.  It is calculated on the basis of foods consumed and calories, sodium, saturated fats, and total fats.

The results of this study lead to obvious policy recommendations for healthier eating:

• More unprocessed or minimally processed foods, fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and seafood
• Less ultra-processed foods, refined grains, and red and processed meats

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Forthcoming November 11, 2025: What To Eat Now

The FDA announced that it is revoking 52 obsolete standards of identity for food products.  It said it is doing this as part of the Trump Administration’s deregulatory agenda.

“I’m eliminating outdated food regulations that no longer serve the interests of American families,” said HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “Today marks a crucial step in my drive to cut through bureaucratic red tape, increase transparency and remove regulations that have outlived their purpose.”

Two readers, Sharon Sass and Ashley Schuering, wrote to ask me to comment on this move.

For starters, the purpose of the Standards of Identity for Food (SOI) is to ensure that a product contains what is expected.  The SOI states what a food must contain, what is optional, and, sometimes. the amount or proportion of ingredient, and the method of production or formulation.

Current SOIs are at 21 C.F.R. Chapter 1, Subchapter B, Parts 131-169.

The easiest example is infant formula.  The SOI states the amounts of each nutrient that must or can be in the formula.  Infants depend entirely on those nutrients.  The SOI makes sense.  The FDA is not touching it at the moment.

It is more difficult to make sense of the SOI for fruit preserves and jams.  One of the rules reads like this:

Any combination of apple and one, two, three, or four of such fruits in which the weight of each is not less than one-fifth and the weight of apple is not more than one-half of the weight of the combination; except that the weight of pineapple may be not less than one-tenth of the weight of the combination.

The SOI also specifies the use of these ingredients:

(1) Nutritive carbohydrate sweeteners.

(2) Spice.

(3) Acidifying agents.

(4) Pectin, in a quantity which reasonably compensates for deficiency, if any, of the natural pectin content of the fruit ingredient.

(5) Buffering agents.

(6) Preservatives.

(7) Antifoaming agents, except those derived from animal fat.

This, it seems to me, could use some updating.

A law firm, Morrison Foerster, has a succinct summary of the relevant regulatory history.

FDA recognized the need to modernize its SOIs dating back to 1995. In 2005, FDA and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) published a proposed rule in an effort to initiate the process of modernizing SOIs. Then, in 2018, as part of the agency’s Nutrition Innovation Strategy, FDA sought to restart its efforts to modernize its aging SOIs. At a public meeting the following year, stakeholders expressed broad support for FDA’s and USDA’s efforts to finalize the 2005 proposed rule and called for a reopening of the comment period for the 2005 proposed rule to collect information on manufacturing, food technology, market trends, and nutrition science. FDA and USDA ultimately reopened the comment period in 2020. Based on the comments received, the agencies withdrew the 2005 proposed rule to “reconsider how best to approach general principles and food standards modernization

Here is the List of Standards Affected by FDA’s First Set of Food Standard Revocation Rulemakings

Comment

I don’t think this makes any difference.  The revocations will give food companies more flexibility in what they put into the listed products, but they will have to disclose the contents of their products on the food label.  Even if they remove real ingredients and substitute additives, they will have to say what is in the products.  The moral: read food labels!

The FDA’s Actions

• A direct final rule revoking standards for 11 types of canned fruits and vegetables that are no longer sold in U.S. grocery stores, including seven standards for fruits artificially sweetened with saccharin or sodium saccharin (and a companion proposed rule in case it needs to adjust this).
• A proposed rule to revoke standards for 18 types of dairy products.
• A proposed rule to revoke standards for 23 types of food products.

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Forthcoming November 11, 2025: What To Eat Now

The USDA has just announced a plan for reorganization that will move most of the agency out of Washington, DC, as flagrant an act of self-destruction as can be imagined.

The ostensible reason for this is to “To bring USDA closer to the people it serves while also providing a more affordable cost of living for USDA employees.”

Forthcoming November 11, 2025: What To Eat Now

A study funded by the Egg Nutrition Center concludes that eating two eggs a day reduces LDL-cholesterol, a risk factor for heart disease.

My NYU colleague, Mitchell Moss, sent me this news release:

Landmark study flips decades of cholesterol panic aimed at eggs:  In a groundbreaking clinical trial, researchers have unraveled the effects of cholesterol and saturated fat, finding that eggs may be far less harmful – and potentially more beneficial – than previously thought. It’s the latest research, using robust scientific work, to recast a nutritional villain in a new light.

My immediate reaction: Who paid for this?

I went right to the study: Impact of dietary cholesterol from eggs and saturated fat on LDL cholesterol levels: a randomized cross-over study, The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition  Volume 122, Issue 1, July 2025, Pages 83-91.

Conclusions: Saturated fat, not dietary cholesterol, elevates LDL cholesterol. Compared with consuming a high-saturated fat diet with only 1 egg/wk, consuming 2 eggs daily as part of a low-saturated fat diet lowers LDL concentrations, which may reduce CVD risk.

Funding.  This work was funded by the Egg Nutrition Center, a division of the American Egg Board. This funding source had no role in the design of this study, and no role in the analysis or interpretation of the data or writing of the manuscript.

Conflict of interest. JDB, AMC and AMH report financial support was provided by Egg Nutrition Center. All other authors report no conflicts of interest.

Comment: This seems like old news.  We’ve known for a long time that saturated fat raises blood cholesterol to a greater extent than does dietary cholesterol.  Eggs are the greatest source of cholesterol in U.S. diets.  But even during the fiercest days of pushing to lower dietary cholesterol, one egg a day was always OK.  Egg consumption has declined and the egg industry wants you to eat more of them.  Does eating two eggs a day really reduce heart disease risk?  It would be nice to have independentlyy funded corroborating research.  This, alas, is an industry-funded study conducted by investigators funded by the egg industry.  The claim that the funding source had no role should raise eyebrows.  Research shows that funding exerts influence, whether recognized by investigators or not.

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Forthcoming November 11, 2025: What To Eat Now

The New York Times Magazine has published an astonishing investigative report about the FDA, totally worth reading: Inside the Collapse of the F.D.A.  How the new health secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is dismantling the agency.

She begins with RFK Jr’s opening salvo on Twitter (X):

FDA’s war on public health is about to end,” Kennedy wrote. “This includes its aggressive suppression of psychedelics, peptides, stem cells, raw milk, hyperbaric therapies, chelating compounds, ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, vitamins, clean foods, sunshine, exercise, nutraceuticals and anything else that advances human health and can’t be patented by Pharma. If you work for the FDA and are part of this corrupt system, I have two messages for you. 1. Preserve your records, and 2. Pack your bags.

Her major point:

It was easy to paint the F.D.A. as a supervillain (an aggressive suppressor of sunlight, vitamins and exercise, to borrow Kennedy’s language), in part because the truth was so much more complex.

What’s impressive about this piece is its dealing with the complexities.  Here’s the critical one.

On the one hand, the agency’s regulators have a truly enormous remit: Which drugs, medical devices, food, pet food, dietary supplements, tobacco products and cosmetics we can buy — one in every five dollars we spend, by official estimates — comes down to the decisions they make. On the other hand, the agency itself is profoundly under-resourced…In fact, its federal budget is roughly the size of the budget of the local school district in Montgomery County, Md., where it is based.

I could go on quoting but everyone should read this piece to realize what is at stake in the current destruction of the FDA—a lot.  We need the FDA, and we need it to be much, much stronger, not weaker.

I want to add one point not discussed in the article: unlike the other agencies in the U.S. Public Health Service, which get their funding from congressional health committees, the FDA gets its funding from congressional agriculture committees.  This dates back to 1906 when the forerunner of the FDA was created as part of the USDA.   When the FDA was transferred to the forerunner of Health and Human Services, its funding remained with agriculture committees, which could not care less about its functions.

The article is long.  If you don’t want to read the whole thing, here are the take-home lessons:  What to Know About the Collapse of the F.D.A. 

USDA Secretary Rollins held a press conference with the dairy industry to announce the removal of artificial color dyes.

This is a voluntary, proactive pledge to eliminate the use of Red 3, Red 40, Green 3, Blue 1, Blue 2, Yellow 5, and Yellow 6 from ice cream and other frozen dairy desserts by 2028.  “I applaud the International Dairy Foods Association for stepping up to eliminate certified artificial colors,” Secretary Kennedy said. “The American people have made it clear—they want real food, not chemicals. Together with Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins and U.S. Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Dr. Marty Makary, we’re holding the food industry accountable and driving a nationwide effort to Make America Healthy Again.”

In 2029, when the dyes are out of ice cream, ice cream will still be ice cream.  Alas.

Here’s an update on what’s happening with artificial colors.  But before getting to it, here’s the result of my research trip to England: Froot Loops with no artificial colors.   Check out what they look like.

Iceland Food Warehouse, Oxford. Photo Jean Lavigne.

And now for the latest on the cancelling of artificial color additives.

• Synthetic dyes are out. Here’s who’s in and how they’re achieving it:  Major food companies like General Mills, Kraft Heinz, Conagra and Smucker are leading a sweeping shift away from synthetic colours. Here’s where the US food industry stands right now… Read more
• FDA redraws the rainbow to dye another day:  The storm over artificial dyes is clearing and the FDA is ushering in a brighter, cleaner food palette. With Red No 3 fading fast and new colours blooming, brands are now racing to catch the rainbow… Read more
• FDA approves natural blue color, urges accelerated phaseout of synthetic red dye The White House asked companies to remove Red No. 3, an artificial color in candy and cereal, sooner than the 2027 deadline put in place by the Biden administration.
• Texas AG targets Mars over continued use of artificial colours: Despite making a public commitment nearly a decade ago to phase out artificial colours, the M&M’s and Skittles maker is in hot water over its continued use of synthetic dyes in the US… Read more

HHS Secretary RFK Jr says he thinks we need more dairy foods in our diets.

“I grew up in a world where milk was the healthiest thing that you could eat,. There’s a tremendous amount of emerging science that talks about the need for more protein in our diet and more fats in our diet. And there’s no industry that does that better than this industry.

More protein?  Most Americans already consume more than twice the amount required.  Protein is in all minimally processed foods.  If you eat enough calories, you are getting plenty of protein.

The focus on protein is baffling to nutritionists like me.  Surveys report that 70% of us are trying to eat more protein.

This has led to protein madness.

To give just one example (another nutritionally hilarious product):

Plants have less protein than meat, dairy, or eggs, but those amounts add up.  Their amino acid composition is not as close to ours as are animal foods, but eating a variety of plants takes care of the differences.

RFK Jr’s push of protein and fat translates to a push for eating more meat and dairy foods.  Recall Brooke Rollins’ statement about getting rid of leftist ideologies in the dietary guidelines?  I was guessing that meant eating more plants.

We have to wait and see what the guidelines say when they come out, and I’m braced for it.