Jerusha Nelson-Peterman

Higher Ed Prepares for New Era of ADA Looming federal regulations update the ADA to make web content and mobile apps more accessible to people, including college students, with disabilities. But universities are scrambling to comply by th...

These new federal regulations--taking effect in just three months--that require digital materials to be accessible still aren't getting the attention they deserve in higher ed. In a decentralized system with limited faculty support, compliance will be a major challenge.

The OBBBA legislation cut SNAP benefits, and much of those cuts aren’t implemented yet. The USDA recently announced that it will no longer publish food security data. The bill is pro-hunger, and USDA is working to make it difficult to measure its impact on hunger.

Related to the issue with the new Dietary Guidelines for Americans about how much time it takes to make food from scratch; a target of last July’s OBBBA legislation was SNAP Education, which is a government program that has provided nutrition education for low income households for 30 years.

I love her books and buy every new one!

Same!

Also, they are elitist (so many people don’t have the time to prepare food from scratch) and the food pictures clearly center the food practices of middle-class white people from approximately 1985-1990.

Your take is excellent. I am a registered dietitian and a professor with a PhD in Food Policy and Applied Nutrition. The new DGA are lots of vibes masquerading as science; definitely not based on good science, but enough reasonable things to have the veneer of science and scientific rigor.

Addition to my academic honesty/AI policy this semester: You may not put any of my slides or handouts into any AI program including but not limited to ChatGPT. The slides and handouts for this class are my intellectual work. I do not consent to having my labor used to train AI. That is labor theft.

There’s also a real contempt (whether intentional or not) for people who have limited resources and a clear dedication to making sure to not in any way try to represent a diverse population.

First overall summary impression: there’s reasonable information and some good science mixed in with a lot of problematic selective science and interpretation. This mix is going to make it very challenging to have a conversation about the Guidelines with people don’t understand scientific consensus.

Additionally, the U.S. Department of Agriculture is one of the agencies behind the Guidelines, and the current USDA leadership is actively working to limit access to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program for low-income Americans. So that will make foods even less accessible.

The focus on minimally processed foods omits a hugely important point, which is that it takes time and money to buy and make these foods and that many people don’t have the that kind of time or money.

And testosterone for men makes an appearance, but they don’t provide any details about why they have included this section.

Chapter 7. Sodium and Other Micronutrients (you know, ALL of the vitamins and minerals), gets one (!) page in the “Scientific Foundation” document, which is less than the space dedicated to “collective observations” about oils and fats.

They go really hard on why they recommend higher protein intake than the National Academies recommends in the DRIs.

They also spend a chunk or space discussing changes in the food system and using almost exclusively observational information to imply that saturated fat and meat are actually good. They have lots of figures to show that it’s science!

This is like a when a podcaster says “I’m just asking questions” but we have mountains of data that have already answered the question.

Instead, they focus on some methodological issues of just a few decades-old research projects as their “evidence” that we don’t actually know if saturated fat and red meat contribute to heart disease.

For example, they ignore a massive body of data over decades that indicates that replacing meat and especially red meat with oils leads to actual better health outcomes.

There is a lot of what appears to be generally correct info about the health of the nation. They then launch into an overview of what they say makes good research and use research methodology terms, but then apply them by cherry-picking data.

I felt like I was reading the transcript to a health influencer podcast. For example, after hammering the importance of randomized control trials (RCTs), they used a lot of detailed observational and cell-level research without any RCT evidence to support some of their claims.

Danone, General Mills, an infant formula company, a supplement company, the Pork Board, and Novo Nordisk.

The “Scientific Review Authors” who contributed to this “Scientific Foundations” document had funding from dairy promotion groups including the National Dairy Council, the National Cattleman’s Beef Association and local associations,

emphasize intake of beans, peas, and lentils and reduce intake of red and processed meats; prioritize beans and lentils over meats for protein sources; include more plant-based recommendations; lower consumption of butter; provide guidance for diverse groups of people.

There is a matrix of how the Guidelines line up with the recommendations of the Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee (DGAC). Some items from this matrix of things they *didn’t* implement that the DGAC recommended: recommend replacing saturated fat with unsaturated fat;

Beyond the Guidelines themselves, the webpage has a “Scientific Foundation for the Dietary Guidelines for Americans” document buried in content after you have to scroll through a bunch of general health statements. Side note; that web page is really irritating to navigate.

and provide some guidance about nutrients but not actual foods (except, of course protein-rich ones) for vegetarians and vegans.

say to limit refined carbohydrates, added sugars alcohol, and sodium; have some very specific but also significantly incomplete info about lifespan nutrition; provide vague guidance for people with “chronic disease;”

say that many meats are a good source of health fats but keep the recommendation to limit saturated fat to 10% of kcal/day; encourage a focus on whole grains over refined grains, but put grains as a way lower priority than meat and other proteins;

say that people should eat dairy and throw in some unexplained references to the microbiome in their “Consume Dairy” section; encourage fruit and vegetable consumption;