In January 1977, after hearings on the national diet, the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs, chaired by Senator George McGovern, issued Dietary Goals for the United States, nutritional guidelines urging Americans to eat less fat, less cholesterol, less refined and processed sugar, and more complex carbohydrates and fiber, aimed at leading causes of death including heart disease, certain cancers and stroke. The committee's eat-less recommendations triggered strong pushback from the cattle, dairy, egg and sugar industries and from the American Medical Association. Under that pressure the committee issued a revised set of guidelines later in 1977 that adjusted the advice on salt and cholesterol and watered down the wording on meat consumption, an early example of the pattern this atlas records honestly elsewhere: dietary fat and cholesterol guidance has shifted repeatedly as evidence and pressure evolved, rather than settling once.
Genuinely contested on the science, not only the politics already described above: the American Medical Association warned in 1977 that the evidence for universal dietary goals was not conclusive, and a 2015 systematic review of the era's own randomized controlled trials (Harcombe et al., Open Heart) found they did not support the fat-reduction recommendation. See the linked open question.
Facts
Milestone Year LocationWashington, D.C., United States 1 Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
The 1977 McGovern Report's dietary-goals recommendations were carried into federal policy by this first edition three years later.
Credited To
In Branch
Sources
1. Wikipedia: United States Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs
WikipediaHearings, investigations, and actions sectionQuote, Hearings, investigations, and actions section
The committee's 'eat less' recommendations triggered strong negative reactions from the cattle, dairy, egg, and sugar industries, including from McGovern's home state.
1. Wikipedia: United States Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs
WikipediaFormation and members sectionQuote, Formation and members section
was named the committee's chairman in July 1968
Wikipedia: George McGovern
WikipediaCredited To: George McGovern, Wikipedia articleQuote, Credited To: George McGovern, Wikipedia article
As sole chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs from 1968 to 1977, McGovern publicized the problem of hunger within the United States and issued the 'McGovern Report', which led to a new set of nutritional guidelines for Americans.
Open Questions (1 open question)
Did the scientific evidence available in 1977 support the Dietary Goals' recommendation to reduce saturated fat intake?
The committee's own contemporaries, including the American Medical Association, argued the randomized-trial evidence available at the time was not conclusive; a 2015 systematic review of that era's trials (Harcombe et al., Open Heart) found they did not support the fat-reduction guidance. The guidance nonetheless anticipated later epidemiological findings that some public health bodies still endorse in modified form, so the historical evidence question and the current guideline question are not the same question.
What would resolve this A historical consensus among nutrition scientists and historians of science on how to weigh the era's limited randomized-trial evidence against later, larger observational and trial evidence; this atlas records the dispute rather than adjudicating it.
Nutrition science, history of scienceZoe Harcombe, Julien S Baker, Stephen Mark Cooper, Bruce Davies, Nicholas Sculthorpe, James J DiNicolantonio, Fergal Grace, Harcombe et al. 2015, Open Heart: RCT Evidence Behind the 1977/1983 Dietary Fat Guidelines
Dissenting Readings (1 dissenting reading)
Description
A 2015 systematic review and meta-analysis of the randomized controlled trial evidence available in 1977 and 1983 found it did not support the recommendation to reduce total or saturated fat intake; contemporaries including the American Medical Association had made the same objection in 1977 itself, arguing the evidence for universal dietary goals was not conclusive.
A dissenting reading, from Harcombe et al., Open Heart, 2015Zoe Harcombe, Julien S Baker, Stephen Mark Cooper, Bruce Davies, Nicholas Sculthorpe, James J DiNicolantonio, Fergal Grace, Harcombe et al. 2015, Open Heart: RCT Evidence Behind the 1977/1983 Dietary Fat Guidelines, Open Heart (BMJ Publishing Group), 2015
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