(The Center Square) – Brooke Rollins, secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, could not commit Tuesday to an August deadline for the release of new dietary guidelines for Americans.
“There will be no commitment because we want to make sure its perfect,” Rollins said.
“We’re working on them; they will be coming soon probably in the coming few months,” Rollins said.
In May, Robert F. Kennedy, the secretary of the U.S. Health and Human Services Department, said the guidelines could come as soon as August.
The division over deadlines for the dietary guidelines reflects a larger instability as The U.S. House Oversight and Government Reform Committee is investigates a study funded by the Biden administration on alcohol guidelines for Americans.
Alcohol guidelines will be key as the USDA and HHS prepare to release its five-year dietary guidelines for Americans.
In January, the Interagency Coordinating Committee on the Prevention of Underage Drinking issued a draft report on its findings analyzing the impact of alcohol intake on overall health.
“The risk of alcohol attributable death increases linearly with alcohol consumption,” the report said.
The draft study found that even one drink a week poses a risk of alcohol attributable death for both males and females.
“Even at low levels of consumption, alcohol had a significant impact on the health of individuals 15 to 39 years of age,” the report said.
U.S. Rep. James Comer, R-Ky., chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform committee, slammed the report’s findings and promised a further investigation.
Comer said the report “skewed widely available information about the effects of alcohol consumption on Americans to favor the Biden administration’s predetermined narrative.”
Comer said the study is “duplicative” of another conducted by the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine at the direction of Congress.
A 2023 World Health Organization report appeared to align with the Interagency Coordinating Committee’s draft report.
“When it comes to alcohol consumption, there is no safe amount that does not affect health,” the WHO report found.
The reports funded by the federal government were designed to contribute to the upcoming dietary guidelines for Americans, a set of recommendations released by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Health and Human Services Department. The guidelines come out every five years.
“The ICCPUD study’s formation outside the transparency of the typical Dietary Guidelines process raises scientific integrity and conflict of interest concerns,” Comer said.
“It is imperative that the dietary guidelines are based on rigorous, sound, and objective scientific evidence, efficiently steward taxpayer dollars, and adhere to congressional intent,” Comer said.
The guidelines have been largely unchanged regarding alcohol consumption recommendations since 1990. However, studies limiting alcohol intake in 2020 were rejected by the first Trump administration for inclusion in the dietary guidelines.
The studies were brought back and funded by the Biden administration.
While Comer is pushing back on new recommendations, it remains unclear which alcohol consumption study will prevail for the final draft of the 2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans.
Kennedy said his guidelines will be shorter than previous administrations and will “tell people, essentially, eat whole food, eat the food that’s good for you.”
• Andrew Rice is an intern reporter and member of the 2025 Searle Freedom Trust and Young America’s Foundation National Journalism Center Apprentice and Internship initiative.
