American Diet Gets an “F”

Americans are still falling short of national dietary recommendations, eating too many sweets and not enough vegetables and whole grains, according to the US Centers for Disease Control & Prevention (CDC). On a national healthy-eating index that measured compliance with U.S. dietary guidelines from 2005, the average overall diet score was only about 60 points out of 100 -- "indicating Americans' diets need improvement," writes lead author R. Bethene Ervin, who looked at data on 4,448 adults ages 20 and older who were enrolled in the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) 2003-2004. Assessing for compliance with the Healthy Eating Index, or HEI-2005, which assesses specific intake of various nutritional categories, she found American adults were well below the maximum standard for whole fruits, dark green and orange vegetables, whole grains, milk, and healthy oils and fats.  Scores for sodium and calories from sugars and alcohol reflected excessive intakes.