Washington • Congress is poised to rein in the nutrition panel that recommended less meat and sugar in U.S. diets, upsetting health advocates who say the body is catering to industry.
Text of a must-pass spending bill released early Wednesday directs the government to study how to revise the panel process "to provide more transparency, eliminate bias, and include committee members with a broad range of viewpoints." It would also block money from being spent to change the guidelines, due at year's end, unless those changes are "limited in scope to dietary and nutritional information."
A report from a government-appointed advisory committee in February meant to inform the guidelines called for reduced sugar and red-meat consumption among Americans. It also included a controversial section on eating habits that encourage environmental sustainability, seen by meat-industry lobbyists as an attack on livestock production, along with public-policy proposals such as a tax on sodas.
"This is about pandering to the meat industry, not public health," said Marion Nestle, a nutrition professor at New York University, who called the push to review the committee "a shocking example" of politics interfering with science.