(The Center Square) – U.S. Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Marty Makary said he is focused on overhauling long-held standards and recommendations within the agency, including “rewriting” the FDA’s food pyramid recommendations created in 1992.
Makary spoke in a lecture series hosted by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., on Wednesday about the priorities of the FDA and future developments within the department.
“The people I think about every day are the people who have less than 500 dollars of cash on hand,” Makary said. “That’s half of America.”
Makary said former food pyramid recommendations placed a greater emphasis on refined carbohydrates and sugar. He said the food pyramid’s recommendations led to overconsumption of ultra processed foods and a high correlation with heart disease.
The FDA replaced the 1992 food pyramid with “MyPlate” which placed an emphasis on vegetables and grains as as the largest portions of meals.
“They picked the wrong dude,” Makary said. “So we’re rewriting the food pyramid right now.”
Makary said he doesn’t think the government should be involved in telling people what to eat. However, he said school lunch programs should be better informed since they are using taxpayer dollars.
“We buy a lot of food as a government,” Makary said. “The Defense Department and the school lunch programs, we can better inform those programs.”
In fiscal year 2023, the National School Lunch Program provided 4.6 billion lunches at the cost of $17.2 billion.
Makary said his efforts to roll back the food pyramid underscore a larger attempt to invite diverse points of view to offer input into FDA recommendations and procedures.
The administration recently hosted panel discussions on the impact of antidepressants for pregnant women, hormone therapy for women in menopause and the impact of fluoride in drinking water.
“Controversy is good in science, have different ideas and talk through them,” Makary said. “Let’s not adopt the modern day censorship philosophy when it comes to different scientific ideas.”
Makary praised the FDA’s work to endorse food colors from “natural sources” and eliminate food dyes and phase out animal testing.
“My personal opinion is that God did not create these animals for us to subjugate and torture unnecessarily,” Makary said.
Makary said he hopes to achieve much more in his time with the FDA. He said he wants to develop a universal flu shot; cures to type 1 diabetes, Alzheimer’s and ALS; and develop alternatives to chemotherapy for cancer treatment.
“My goal is very simple,” Makary said. “I’d like to see more cures and meaningful treatments for the American public.”
