National Dietary Guides Should Be Based On Healthy Vegan Diet

A whole foods, low-fat plant-based diet should form the basis of national dietary guidelines, according to a new study.

A group of international experts in health and nutrition produced an “unbiased, sustainable, evidence-informed Universal Food Guide” as a template for countries to develop healthy nutrition guidelines. They sought to address the growing rates of diet-related diseases and “pervasiveness of industry bias” in many government diet recommendations.

According to the study, commercial interests have spread myths that a whole food vegan diet is nutritionally inadequate. However, there is plenty of scientific evidence supporting such a diet as the healthiest option. Meanwhile there is little to back up the claim that animal products are necessary for health.

The authors propose a Universal Food Guide to inform policymakers, health experts, and the public of the benefits of eating a whole food vegan diet. It recommends eating three or more servings of legumes daily, four servings of fruit, five servings of vegetables, three servings of whole grains, and a serving of nuts or seeds.

“The gold standard”

According to the study, the standard western or Amercian diet, known as SWAD, has become normalized and people have “acquired a taste” for it. But it has been shown by science to have worse health outcomes than a whole food vegan diet.

The study notes that no other diet has been shown to be as effective at preventing, managing, and in some cases reversing non-communicable diseases. A whole food vegan diet is also the most effective for reducing food-related environmental impacts. Greater adherence to a healthy plant-based diet also come with greater health benefits, without any documented harmful effects, says the study. This is in contrast to diets which include animal products, which come with greater health risks the more they include such products.

The “whole-food, low-fat vegan eating pattern could justifiably serve as a new reference healthy eating pattern, i.e., the ‘gold dietary standard’, against which other dietary patterns could be compared,” the study says.

Universal Food Guide

The study makes recommendations for a Universal Food Guide based on the research in plant-based nutrition of Dr. Michael Greger and Dr. Neal Barnard. It notes that neither has vested or political interests and both work in a non-profit capacity on the topic.

Countries should devise food guides based on their recommendations to eat daily at least three servings of legumes, four of berries and other fruit, five of cruciferous and other vegetables, and three of whole grains. A daily serving of flaxseeds, nuts and seeds, and herbs and spices are also recommended.

The proposed Universal Food Guide is also intended to be very clear on what not to eat, avoiding the “ambiguous” terms found in national guidelines about some foods such as “limiting” animal products. The study suggests that national food guides should include information addressing “commonly-perpetuated nutrition myths.” These includes that children need to drink milk after weaning and athletes need meat. “These myths detract from people making health food choices,” the authors write.

Corporate lobbying

While national food guidelines are supposed to help inform policymakers and the public about healthy food choices, they are not always based on science.

The study traces the inclusion of many animal-based foods in dietary guidelines to corporate lobbying to amend the first edition of dietary guidelines in 1977. The original text had recommended decreasing the consumption of animal products, along with saturated fat, salt, and sugar. But lobbyists “succeeded in having the wording in the report changed” to recommend eating more “meat, poultry, and fish which will reduce saturated fat intake.”

Food guides in other countries that emerged after this point began to reflect the US guidelines. The study argues that an American-style diet has eroded healthier diets in other countries and that there has been a corresponding increase in diet-related diseases globally.