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A member of the Biden Administration panel that will determine new dietary guidelines for Americans is receiving criticism for his comments on obesity.
Dr. Fatima Cody Stanford, an obesity medicine physician at Mass General Health in Boston, has been named to the 2025 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee, which will develop new recommended eating habits for Americans in the coming years.
The appointment has received backlash, as it comes just weeks after he downplayed the value of diet and exercise on weight loss in an interview with 60 Minutes earlier in the year.
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and Agriculture (USDA) develop these guidelines every five years. Earlier versions have been blamed for fueling America’s obesity crisis.
Dr. Fatima Cody Stanford (pictured), an obesity medicine physician at Mass General Health, said obesity is more of a genetic condition than one caused by lifestyle factors during a 60 Minutes interview.
The USDA released the Food Pyramid in 1991 and has since been partly blamed for the sharp rise in obesity in the United States. Critics say it provides poor recommendations that aren’t based on science, and that its high recommended levels of grains and starches helped make many people overweight
Dr. Cody’s appointment comes as the US remains one of the fattest countries in the world, according to a new report.
“The number one cause of obesity is genetics,” said Dr. Cody.
‘That means if you are born to parents who are obese, you have a 50 to 85 per cent chance of having the disease yourself. Even with optimal diet, exercise, sleep management, stress management.’
Dr Shauna Levy, an expert in bariatric surgery at Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana, told DailyMail.com: ‘I think Dr Cody’s comment was an oversimplification of the cause of the disease.
“However, I also believe that, as a society, we probably underestimate the role of genetics in causing obesity and overestimate the role that diet and exercise play in treating this disease.”
Dr. Cody Stanford will be on a panel of 20 nutrition, obesity and weight loss experts from across the country included on the HHS and USDA panel.
The group will work to establish new dietary guidelines in the US beginning in 2025. Every five years, new government nutrition guidelines are established.
‘The 2025 Committee will examine the relationship between diet and health at all stages of life, and will use a health equity lens in its review of evidence to ensure that factors such as socioeconomic status, race, ethnicity, and culture are described and considered to the greatest extent possible. possible,’ read a USDA press release.
He goes on to say that the panel has “substantial” experience in health equity, and that factor was considered when they were chosen.
This committee will use guidelines from schools, hospitals, and other facilities to establish diet plans.
It is also likely that nutritionists and dietitians across the United States will make recommendations to parents based on the decisions made by this panel.
However, these guidelines have been criticized in the past. In 1992, the USDA introduced the food pyramid.
It recommended six to 11 servings a day of starchy foods such as rice and bread, three to five servings of vegetables, two to four servings of fruit, two to three servings of meat and dairy, and moderate use of fats, oils, and sweets. .
Some have pointed to this pyramid as the trigger point for the crisis in the United States, which now sees more than 70 percent of the country overweight and almost half obese.
The pyramid has been widely criticized for its focus on portion sizes rather than helping a person control calorie levels, and for its recommendation not to eat fatty foods, which could be part of a healthy diet.
“Well, this pyramid really isn’t supported by good scientific evidence, and it was really out of date from the day it was printed in 1991,” said Dr. Walter Willet, former president of the Harvard School of Public Health. told PBS.
Dr. Mark Hyman, an American wellness expert, wrote in 2016: ‘Here’s the truth: Government recommendations published in 1980 promoting low-fat diets have catapulted us into the worst obesity and diabetes epidemic in history.’
He points to the large number of carbohydrates recommended by the pyramid and says that the body converts those carbohydrates into sugar and fat in the body.
Dr. Hyman also cautions that highly processed refined carbohydrates lead to inflammation in the body.
MyPlate has since replaced the pyramid and has faced similar criticism.
Obesity is classified as having a body mass index of 40 or more. It is calculated by comparing a person’s height with their weight.
Scientists have long known that a person’s weight is a matter of how many calories a person eats compared to what they burn.
The number of calories a person burns each day is based primarily on their metabolism, which is the process the body uses to convert food into energy. A person with a high metabolism will consume more calories while resting throughout the day.
A low-calorie diet and increasing the number of calories burned each day through exercise can help a person lose weight.
When a person eats excess calories, it is stored as fat or muscle in the body, causing weight gain.
How fast a person’s metabolism works is affected by their genetic profile, age, the amount of physical activity they get each day, and muscle-to-fat ratio.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) says that obesity is “rarely” caused by hereditary patterns.
The most common gene linked to obesity, MC4R, is found in less than five percent of obese people, the CDC says.
“In the majority of obese people, no single genetic cause can be identified,” the agency writes.
But Dr. Christopher McGowan, a North Carolina-based specialist in obesity medicine, told DailyMail.com that genetic factors could make it difficult for an overweight person to lose weight.
“In today’s increasingly obese environment, people with a genetic propensity to gain weight are more likely to do so,” he said.
“Losing gained weight becomes increasingly difficult due to the body’s innate weight-promoting systems. Ultimately, due to these underlying genetic factors, obesity represents a disorder of energy regulation.”
He says these genetic factors can be overcome by adapting a person’s lifestyle with diet and exercise.
Obesity has been linked to a multitude of deadly health conditions, including diabetes, heart disease, Alzheimer’s, liver disease, and more.