So What is Healthy Food and Why is HHRA Focused on Food Nutritional Quality?

Eaters Deserve More Complete Information About Nutrition and Health Impacts on Food Labels
Multiple lines of evidence point to consumer food choices as major contributors to diet-related disease, and poor health and fitness. In a peer-reviewed journal article published today, authors Chuck Benbrook and Robin Mesnage cite studies indicating that “Some 90% of the estimated USD 4.3 trillion in annual health care costs in the US is triggered or made worse by poor food quality and diet-related disease.” Benbrook is the founder and former executive director of the Heartland Health Research Alliance (HHRA). The authors recommend novel metrics on both the nutrient density of food, and how to more accurately and usefully characterize the degree of food processing and its impacts on public health. The article is open access in the journal Foods and entitled “Enhanced Labeling to Promote Consumption of Nutrient Dense Foods and Healthier Diets.” The core nutrient density metric is a ratio: the percent of daily nutrient needs satisfied by a serving of food relative to the percent of a 2000 calorie daily diet taken up by the serving of food. This single metric is unmatched in comprehensively reflecting the nutritional quality of food. A graphic option to convey the metric on packaging is presented in Figure 3 in the new paper: A novel graphic is presented in Figure 5 to which integrates both the nutrient density and food processing metrics and graphics in a single graphic, shown below. The impacts of ultra-processed food (UPF) on public health outcomes is among the hottest topics in nutrition, medical, and public health journals, and media coverage on food quality and health outcomes. At the request of the journal, the authors developed a video abstract that explains the paper’s goals, methods, and key findings and recommendations. The authors conclude their paper with these observations: Transparent and accurate food product-specific ingredient and nutrient composition data should determine the content of nutrition health labeling. Efforts to soften the message should be resisted in light of the overwhelming need for new food labels that help bring about substantial improvements in food nutritional quality and dietary choices. Benbrook and Mesnage’s paper builds on public comments HHRA submitted in response to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) proposed rule in 2023 to update the definition of the term “healthy” on food labels. The proposed role would require foods labeled “healthy” to contain minimum amounts of foods recommended by USDA’s Dietary Guidelines, and to limit saturated fat, sodium, added sugar and other less healthy nutrients. Entitled “Food Labeling: Nutrient Content Claims; Definition of Term `Healthy’”, the comments recommended new nutrition/health messaging on the front of food packaging. Co-authors of comments included the chair of HHRA’s Policy Advisory committee Dr. Kathleen Merrigan, HHRA science advisors, and other experts working on how changes in farming systems and technology can increase the nutritional quality of food: Dr. Hannah Flower, Dr. Donald R. Davis, Dr. David Montgomery and Anne Biklé. In the comments, the authors introduced “NuCal” as a name for their new system. Resources HHRA February 2023 comments to the FDA. Benbrook and Mesnage (2024). Enhanced Labeling to Promote Consumption of Nutrient Dense Foods and Healthier Diets, Foods. https://doi.org/10.3390/foods13213377 Video Abstract: “Enhanced Labeling to Promote Consumption of Nutrient Dense Foods and Healthier Diets”
HHRA Weighs in on Key Pesticide Issues Under Review by the National Organic Standards Board
HHRA and ORG-Tracker, represented by Dr. Chuck Benbrook and Dr. Brian Baker, submitted comments to the Agricultural Marketing Service at the USDA in advance of the National Organic Standards Board (NOSB) meeting in Portland, Oregon, from October 22nd to 24th, 2024. Drs. Benbrook and Baker will both attend the conference and deliver public comments. ORG-Tracker is a project carried out by HHRA. It aggregates pesticide residue data from inspections of organic farms carried out by certifiers. The tables generated by ORG-Tracker utilize the results of certifier testing to compare residue frequency and risk levels to food produced on conventional farms. The team is working to more effectively highlight gaps and challenges faced by certification agencies to answer questions like What crops should we be testing, and where? Is a pesticide residue found in an organic sample likely caused by accident, pesticide drift, or an intentional and illegal application? How can we modify organic programs to better mitigate risk? The comments delivered to the USDA discuss risk-based certification, pesticide residue testing, and policies impacting the incorporation of so-called inert ingredients in the biopesticides approved for use on organic farms. They argue for a more rigorous, comprehensive, and health-focused approach to risk oversight. Regarding residue testing, they advocate for more expansive and effective data aggregation to inform consumers and the organics community. Finally, for inert ingredients, they recommend further review of current policy, including increased transparency of ingredients in pesticide products. Thank you to Drs. Benbrook and Baker for your advocacy and hard work! The three sets of comments are posted on HHRA’s website as part of our policy program: Comments to the NOSB on the Risk-Based Certification Discussion Document Under Consideration During the October 2024 Meeting in Portland, Oregon Written Comments on the NOSB Discussion Document “Residue Testing for the Global Supply Chain” Comments on the Inert Ingredients in Organic Pesticide Products Proposal dated August 13, 2024 Drs. Benbrook and Baker also submitted and presented comments at the Spring 2024 meeting of the NOSB, which are available on HHRA’s Policy and Regulatory Reform page.
Dr. Kimberly Yolton joins HHRA board
Dr. Yolton is a developmental psychologist and epidemiologist serving as Professor of Pediatrics at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. Her interests include exposures and experiences that may alter a child’s developmental trajectory from infancy through adolescence. She collaborates on research projects on typical child development as well as those focused on the impact of exposures to environmental toxicants, opiates and stress during early development.
Paul Hartnett, HHRA’s Executive Director
Paul Hartnett has served as HHRA’s CFO since our founding . With the departure of Russell King, Paul has now joined the board and Executive Director. We thank Russell for his service and wish him the best in his future endeavors.
Heartland Study Enrolls 1,000th Mother-Infant Pair
July 19, 2024 – In June of this year, the Heartland Study achieved a major milestone, enrolling its 1,000th mother-infant pair. Enrollment is now at 50% of goal. The objective of the Study is to help fill major gaps in our understanding of the impacts of herbicides on maternal and infant health. Currently in Phase 1, the Study is focused on evaluating associations between herbicide concentrations in body fluids and tissue samples from pregnant women and infants, and pregnancy/childbirth outcomes. Phase 2 is designed to evaluate potential associations between herbicide biomarkers and early childhood neurological development. Much appreciation for the mothers enrolled, and the entire Heartland Study Team including scientists, support staff and clinicians for this tremendous achievement, and for our funders to making this work possible. Read more about the study including peer-reviewed studies published in Chemosphere and Agrichemicals at our publications page. The investment required to conduct this study exceeds $1 million each year. You can support this important work by making a donation here.

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A full pizza on a plate with a knife, fork, and fresh vegetables next to it. Adults alive today have lived through efforts to address four existential threats to our individual and collective health: smoking, AIDs, Covid, and food and diets that undermine health and promote chronic disease.

For the first three threats, our collective response has been sustained and successful and has improved America’s public health.

A combination of new science, prevention-focused public health interventions, the capacity of US industry to innovate quickly when essential to do so, and the commonsense can-do spirit of Americans has markedly reduced smoking and associated disease, turned AIDs from a death sentence to a mostly manageable disease, and saved millions of lives as the Covid pandemic unfolded.

But on the fourth grand challenge we have made no progress and unfortunately, key measures of how food is altering America’s public health are headed in the wrong direction.

Poor quality food and unhealthy dietary patterns are largely behind a sobering fact – at least two-thirds of deaths in the US, as well as many of the chronic diseases that undermine quality of life are caused largely or partially by unhealthy food and poor dietary choices.

There is both great tragedy and irony in the fact that US farmers and the food industry have the ability to produce the healthiest food supply in the world, but clearly are not, and most American consumers can afford healthy food, but don’t seek it out.

Growing and Manufacturing Healthy Food

Our food system could quickly and seamlessly enhance the healthfulness of the American diet. Every consumer, one day at a time, could choose healthier foods.

Yet about two-thirds of the American diet falls far short of promoting health. Far too many unhealthy food products are tasty, relatively inexpensive and are for sale everywhere. For the food industry, today’s highly processed foods are easy to manufacture, ship, and sell and they deliver the most consistent profits. Unhealthy food products are what many consumers prefer and hence what the market demands.

The only way to bring about change on the scale needed is for the government, farmers, and the food industry to unite in an all-hands-on-deck effort to turn healthy food into the most sought after — and the most profitable option. This effort needs to start now and must be sustained over at least a generation.

A critical first step is for the government to confront the 800-pound gorilla hiding in plain sight in the closet of the American food industry – What makes one food healthy and another one not so?

With the release in September 2022 of a Proposed Rule to define what makes “healthy” food healthy, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) initiated one of the hopefully most-consequential rule makings ever in terms of helping Americans turn around deeply embedded adverse trends in health outcomes.

FDA requested public comments on its Proposed Rule and HHRA’s Public Policy Advisory Committee has weighed in with detailed comments. See this “In the News” item for an overview of our recommendations to the FDA, and this news coverage of the HHRA comments. And stay tuned as this critical rule making process unfolds.