Big news: Congress has just mandated a review of the Dietary Guidelines for Americans. This is the first time ever, in the 35 year history of the guidelines:
Washington Post: Congress: We need to review the Dietary Guidelines for AmericansThis is important because it's the first time Congress has noted there is a problem with the Dietary Guidelines process," said David McCarron, research associate at the Department of Nutrition at the University of California-Davis.... "There's a lot of stuff in the guidelines that was right forty years ago but that science has disproved. Unfortunately, sometimes, the scientific community doesn't like to backtrack."
There have been a lot of questions about how the guidelines could still recommend avoiding saturated fat, for example.
Probably the people responsible are just stuck in a way of thinking that made sense back in the 1980s. Unfortunately that's when the obesity epidemic got started, and we can't solve it with the same flawed thinking that got us into this mess.
Thankfully the problem with the mistaken low-fat advice can't be hidden forever. Nothing like a big spotlight and open discussion to weed out old thinking and old mistakes.
