Here is one of the most wrong-headed reports I’ve read in a long time. Cutting School Food Subsidies

The US Department of Agriculture runs a large array of farm and food subsidy programs. The school lunch and breakfast programs are two of the largest, which together with related school food programs will cost federal taxpayers an estimated $35 billion in 2025. Thirty million children, about 58 percent of students in public schools, receive school food benefits. The original goal of the school lunch and breakfast programs was to tackle hunger, but the main nutrition problem for children today is not inadequate calories but excessive consumption of unhealthy foods and obesity. Hence, subsidizing school food is an outdated use of federal dollars. Congress should repeal school food programs to reduce budget deficits and hand power back to the states. State and local governments should decide what sort of school food policies to adopt for their own residents.

Oh great.

I have a completely different take on this.

School meals are demonstrably healthier that a lot of food offered to kids these days.  The biggest problem with school meals is that they don’t serve enough children.  During the pandemic, when school meals were universal, kids and their families did better.

If the problem with school meals is too much unhealty food, the remedy is straightforward: make the meals healthier and give schools enough money to do that.

Fortunately, some states require universal school meals.  They all should do that.

The Cato report should be understood for what it is: an attempt to cut budget for social programs.

Apparently, dog chews made in China may be causing werewolf syndrome in dogs in the UK.

A total of 10 different Barkoo and Chrisco branded chews have been linked to werewolf syndrome by teh FSA [Food Standards Agency] and EU.  They have best before dates ranging from Decembrer 2025 to June 2027.

Werewolf syndrome? 

The term werewolf syndrome has gained traction online as shorthand for a cluster of symptoms reported in dogs who appear to have consumed certain chew products. While not an official medical diagnosis, the term groups together sudden neurological symptoms such as:

• Sudden, unprovoked aggression or fearfulness.

• Excessive barking, crying or howling.

• Hyperactivity or restlessness.

• Destructive tendencies, such as chewing furniture.

Physical symptoms such as epileptic-style seizures, vomiting, diarrhoea and lethargy have also been observed in some cases.

The cause?  Unknown (mycotoxins?).

No cases have been reported from the U.S.

What to do?  Don’t feed those chews to dogs.

I’ve been collecting items on new and emerging food products.  Enjoy!

• Cow-less casein protein ‘first’ creates full cheese spectrum: A full spectrum of ‘cheeses’ can be made without cows, following the development of a casein that can self-assemble into micelles, the foundation for stretchy, protein-rich cheese alternatives…. Read more
• Are watermelon seeds the next breakthrough in plant-based milk?  Watermelon seed-based non-dairy beverage Milkish won “fan favorite” in the Fancy Face-Off pitch at the Winter Fancy Food Show – but can it win over retailers and shoppers?… Watch now
• Cell-cultured mouse “mousse” petfood headed for commercial release.  BioCraft Pet Nutrition has partnered with Prefera Petfood to commercialise a hypoallergenic, nutritionally complete cat food made almost entirely from cell-cultured mouse…. Read more 
• Cultivated dinosaur meat hits the market in food tech first: Hitting a major food tech milestone, scientists have developed and launched a range of products made from cultivated dinosaur meat… Read more
• Seaweed has an ocean of potential, but headwinds remain: Investment and climate are barriers for the seaweed to innovate and achieve all it can achieve… Read more
• Green Queen Better Meat secures U.S. patent for turning potato waste into mycoprotein The Better Meat Co has secured its sixth U.S. patent for a process that uses potato-processing waste to grow high-protein, high-fiber mycelium, offering a sustainable, nutrient-rich alternative to conventional meat. Read More

And then,

• How Coca-Cola is using Minute Maid to push into alcohol: The soda giant’s Red Tree Beverages subsidiary is making a bet that its vodka lemonade can help it gain a stronger foothold in booze.

It’s a brave new food world out there.  I wonder how cell-cultured dinosaur meat tastes…

I was riveted by this report in the Wall Street Journal: USDA Is Fast-Tracking Requests to Yank Soda From Food-Stamps Program.

The Agriculture Department is fast-tracking state requests to yank soda and candy from food-stamp programs. Arkansas and Indiana are among the first in line.

Both states Tuesday said they were seeking clearance from the USDA to implement the changes, and Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said her agency would move “very, very quickly” to approve them.

“That’s exactly the vision of making America healthy again,” Rollins said in an interview. “I am 100% certain that these changes will be nothing but positive for those underserved communities that are food challenged.”

I’m also riveted by the American Beverage Association statement that provoked her remarks

It’s disappointing that Governor Sanders and Secretary Rollins are choosing to be the food police rather than take truly meaningful steps to lift people off SNAP with good-paying jobs. Nearly 80 percent of families on SNAP work, they just don’t make enough to make ends meet. Low-income working families were promised a new, better era and not to be left behind again. Instead, they’re being denigrated and treated like second-class citizens.

WHAT?  The American Beverage Association is also sounding like me when it comes to root causes of poverty in America?  I never thought I would hear anything like this from that organization.

OK, so what’s going on here.

Let’s start from the beginning.  When Congress was considering authorizing food stamps in 1964, a few foods were excluded from benefits, soft drinks among them.  But lobbying from soft drink companies and retailers (who make money from soda purchases on food stamps) quashed that idea.

About ten years ago, a presidential commission on SNAP (the successor to food stamps), on which I served, recommended pilot projects to test the effectiveness and recipient responses of adding sugary beverages to the small list of foods that cannot be purchased using Electronic Benefit Transfer (EBT) cards.  Several states and cities petitioned the USDA for “waivers” that would allow them to run pilot projects.  In all cases, the USDA rejected the proposals.

The Trump Administration USDA is reconsidering.

This is not a simple issue.

PRO: 

Public health: Sodas contain sugars but nothing else of nutritional value (empty calories), and are well documented to derange metabolism, increase calorie intake, and to be associated with obesity and chronic disease.

Political: SNAP recipients spend too much money on sodas; taxpayers should not support unhealthful food choices.  SNAP recipients could continue to buy sodas with their own money, just not EBT cards.

CON

Anti-hunger: Removing sodas from SNAP constitutes government interference with personal choice, is condescending, and is unfair to people who have few ways to treat themselves.

Political: Taking sodas out of SNAP is a cover for the Republican agenda to cut SNAP benefits.

Comment

It looks like the USDA will approve state requests.  I have been in favor of pilot projects for a long time, on public health grounds.  But—I want to see careful research studies not only looking at changes is purchases among SNAP recipients, but also at how they perceive the new requirements.

More on this

• USDA’s Snap Rule Waiver home page
• Arkansas governor’s press release
• Idaho governor’s press release
• Indiana governor’s press release
• Indiana to restrict food stamps, put work requirements on Medicaid

Christopher Gardner writes me that the next time I need an example of an industry-funded study, I should take a look at this one.  Happy to.

The Study: A Mediterranean-Style Diet with Lean Beef Lowers Blood Pressure and Improves Vascular Function: Secondary Outcomes from a Randomized Crossover Trial.  Jennifer A Fleming, Kristina S Petersen, kup63@psu.edu, Penny M Kris-Etherton, David J Baer. Current Developments in Nutrition, Volume 9, Issue 4, 104573.

Objectives: “The aim was to evaluate the effects of a MED diet incorporating 0.5 oz./d (MED0.5), 2.5 oz./d (MED2.5) and 5.5 oz./d (MED5.5) of lean beef compared with an Average American diet (AAD) on vascular health [brachial and central blood pressure, pulse wave velocity (PWV), and augmentation index].”

Methods: “In random sequence order, participants consumed each test diet for 4 wk. Vascular outcomes were assessed at baseline and the end of each diet period.”

Results:  “PWV was lower following MED0.5…and MED2.5… compared with the AAD; PWV was nominally lower after the MED5.5 compared with the AAD…Central systolic blood pressure was lower following the MED0.5…and MED2.5…compared with the AAD…Brachial systolic and diastolic pressure were lower following all 3 MED diets compared with the AAD (P < 0.05).

Conclusions: Compared with an AAD, MED diets containing 0.5 and 2.5 oz./d of lean beef improved brachial and central systolic and diastolic blood pressure and arterial stiffness. Our findings suggest that a MED diet with ≤5.5 oz./d of lean beef does not adversely affect vascular function.

Conflict of interest: JAF received travel funds from the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association for giving presentations on this research. PMK-E and DJB received funding from the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association for the research reported in this article. KSP has received grants from the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association to conduct other research projects. KSP has also received honoraria from the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association for consulting work unrelated to the research presented in this paper.

Comment:  Professor Gardner noted that the AAD diet contained 3,500 mg sodium/day, whereas all three of the Mediterranean/beef diets had lower sodium (<2,300 mg/day).  Could reduced sodium have anything to do with the reduced blood pressure observed on the two diets containing lower amounts of beef (Med 0.5 and Med 2.5)?  The authors, alas do not discuss this point.  This makes this study appear to have been designed to demonstrate that eating beef does not adversely affect blood pressure.  Research on the effects of industry funding demonstrate that funders do not need to have a role in the design, conduct, etc of a study to exert influence.  Consciously or unconsciously, intentionally or unintentionally, funding recipients want to please their sponsors.  Studies of the effect of diet on blood pressure need to control for sodium intake.

Stuart Gillespie.  Food Fight: From Plunder and Profit to People and the Planet.  Canongate, 2025.

I wrote a blurb for this book:

From his years of experience working in international nutrition, Gillespie has on-the-ground knowledge of why and how global food systems lead to widespread hunger, obesity, and environmental damage, and what needs to be done to make those systems healthier for all.  He makes it clear that this food fight is crucial to take on.

I particularly like his discussion of what is needed to transform food systems:

‘Food system transformation’ has become the mother of all development clichés in this decade.  The real goal of many who invoke it is not real transformation—it’s more about fiddling on the fringe.  To truly overhaul the food system, we need to see a major shift in the structure and dynamic of power.  Unsurprisingly, those in power now don’t really want such a shift, whatever they proclaim in conferences, interviews, and annual reports…What’s really being discussed in these conferences and reports is transition, not transformation.

On the need for a real food movement:

Linking people working separately on obesity, undernutrition or the climate crisis is one of the big challenges in creating concerted local-to-global action.  No transformative social movement yet exists that addresses malnutrition.  It’s about time.

Indeed, yes.

This announcement on X of his resignation from NIH comes from Kevin Hall, who did the study I admire so much on how ultra-processed foods induce people to eat more calories (500 more a day!).

Unfortunately, recent events have made me question whether NIH continues to be a place where I can freely conduct unbiased science. Specifically, I experienced censorship in the reporting of our research because of agency concerns that it did not appear to fully support preconceived narratives of my agency’s leadership about ultra-processed food addiction.

I was hoping this was an aberration. So, weeks ago I wrote to my agency’s leadership expressing my concerns and requested time to discuss these issues, but I never received a response.

Without any reassurance there wouldn’t be continued censorship or meddling in our research, I felt compelled to accept early retirement to preserve health insurance for my family. (Resigning later in protest of any future meddling or censorship would result in losing that benefit.)

Due to very tight deadlines to make this decision, I don’t yet have plans for my future career.

Comment

I consider Hall’s departure from NIH a national tragedy.

It is utterly shameful that NIH was not allowing him to talk about his science openly because its results don’t fit with aspects of the MAHA (Make America Health Again) narrative.  It is shocking that NIH refused to allow him to sign papers he co-authored because they mentioned equity—one of the hundreds of words forbidden by this administration.

His work was essential to the MAHA agenda—exactly the science needed to promote public health.  NIH is part of HHS, which is headed by RFK Jr, who leads MAHA.

Hall’s treatment does not bode well for the MAHA movement.  Instead, it casts doubt on this movement’s credibility.

Hall’s group is the only one I know of that was able to conduct carefully controlled clinical trials of calorie intake and weight gain.  His study subjects are monitored; they cannot “forget” what they ate, or lie about it, or eat what they are not supposed to.  No other nutrition studies have this level of control.

His ultra-processed study had an enormously important result, not least because it was so unexpected.  Hall went into the study thinking that ultra-processing would not make any difference.  The 500 calorie difference was a big surprise.  That’s the way science is supposed to work; this was real science in action.

Hall was engaged in further studies to determine the mechanism underlying the calorie finding.  Let’s hope someone continues them.

I view his resignation under these circumstances as an act of extraordinary courage and scientific integrity.

He deserves our deepest respect and appreciation.

For more on this

• Kevin Hall’s complete statement on Twitter (X)
• CNN Health’s account: Top NIH nutrition researcher studying ultraprocessed foods departs, citing censorship under Kennedy (I’m quoted)
• The New York Times account: Leading Nutrition Scientist Departs N.I.H., Citing Censorship.  This quotes Hall:“We experienced what amounts to censorship and controlling of the reporting of our science,” Dr. Hall said, adding that he was worried that if he stayed, officials might also interfere with the design and execution of his studies. “That would make me hate my job every day”…In February, Dr. Hall said that N.I.H. officials told him he couldn’t be listed as an author on a yet-to-be-published scientific review on ultraprocessed foods that he co-wrote with a group of university scientists. This was because the review included language about “health equity” (it acknowledged that some people in the United States don’t have access to healthy food)…If Dr. Hall wanted to stay on the paper, they said, that section would need to be modified. Dr. Hall removed his name — a first in his career as a government scientist.
• Jane Black on Consumed:  MAHA just cost the NIH its star nutrition researcher. Nutrition research has always been a red-headed stepchild at NIH, underfunded and undervalued. In 2023, the NIH allocated $2.2 billion to nutrition research, just over 4 percent of its total research budget. This, despite the fact that nearly 40 percent of Americans are obese, and the cost of obesity-related medical care is estimated to be nearly $173 billion annually…And this is why Kevin Hall matters so much. Against the odds, Hall was performing randomized controlled trials. He was conducting them on ultra-processed foods, the hottest issue in nutrition policy. He has persisted in the face of deep cuts: In 2017, the NIH clinical trial unit went from 10 beds to seven, reducing the speed at which Hall could conduct his research.
• Ted Kyle on ConscienHealth: In March, Hall and colleagues published a study in Cell Metabolism and concluded: “The etiology of common obesity is more complex than dopamine-mediated ultra-processed food addiction, and the neurochemistry associated with excess adiposity, such as increased dopamine tone, is not analogous to a state of drug tolerance.”  This apparently did not fit well enough with Kennedy’s narrative that ultra-processed foods are “poisoning” Americans because they are addictive and full of chemicals that harm us.
• MSNBC interview with Chris Hayes.

Washington Post: As egg prices soared at the supermarket, so did producer profits: A USDA program doled out hundreds of millions in relief payments to big egg companies, even as the largest earned record profits.

On Tuesday, the nation’s largest egg producer, Mississippi-based Cal-Maine, announced quarterly profits of $509 million, more than three times what it made in the same period a year ago. It caps three years of extraordinary earnings, which have surged since the avian flu outbreak began in 2022.

By wiping out millions of laying hens, the avian flu has slowed egg production for many companies. But the outbreak also has driven up prices enough for some companies to recoup losses and, for Cal-Maine, to record exceptional profits….At the same time, Cal-Maine and other large egg companies have received tens of millions of dollars from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which has been doling out relief payments to help egg companies restock after the virus strikes.