While it is true that there are quite a lot of people go shopping with the Canada Food Guide in hand, does not mean that manual does not play a very important role in the health of our nation. Hailed by Health Canada as a second government document most downloaded behind the tax forms, he serves as a nutrition background of our country. The underlying policy guidelines and diet programs in the schools of our publicly funded, hospitals, arenas and companies; taught to our children, our future doctors, nutritionists and other health professionals as gospel; and it is used by the food industry to advertise the health benefits of their products.

It is also nice and completely broken.

Latest oversight of the Guidelines has come with the publication of Alissa Hamilton Got milked?, In which he explores how the milk come to enjoy such a major role in national dietary guidelines in North America despite the role that does not have a strong evidence base to support me t. Milk is a great source of calcium and protein, but by no means the only source of them, and unless you ask the dairy industry, there are plenty of other places to find them.

Guides broken from the get-go. In essence, our guide today are designed to ensure that Canadians who follow him will meet their "nutritional" requirements. And while this may sound like a wise plan, most of what we understand correctly about the impact of diet on chronic disease prevention does not come from the consumption of adequate amounts of specific "nutrients," but wider than the pattern of food-based meal.

Encouraging dietary pattern that is designed to lead Canada to get enough zinc, vitamin A, niacin and phosphorus (among others) as a means of protecting public health can inadvertently steer Canada away from the overall pattern of food consumption that evidence supports as the most healthful ,

Overhyped focus on nutrition also plays into the hands of the food industry, because in many cases the companies are legally allowed to promote the presence or addition of certain nutrients on the front of the product packaging they imply a healthy contents (no, the presence of whole grains and fiber in Froot Loops do not excites me).

Also damaged from the get-go is a direct inclusion of Health Canada of the food industry in the creation Guide.

Take, for example, the 12-member Advisory Committee on the Food Guide plays a vital role in shaping Guide Canada still use today. Fully 25 percent of the people in the committee integral employed at the time by the company that the main interest will be affected by the very recommendation Guide.

Among the members of the nutrition education manager for the BC Dairy Foundation, executive director of the Vegetable Oil Industry of Canada and director of scientific and regulatory affairs at the Food and Consumer Products Manufacturers of Canada, which represents the interests of companies such as PepsiCo, Frito-Lay and Coca-Cola.

As to whether these people have an influence on the final product, you be the judge. The CFG recommends that each Canadian consumes between 2-3 glasses of milk and 2-3 tablespoons of unsaturated fat each day. As far as producers go, the CFG recommends Canada only "limit" non-consumption of natural trans-fats, despite the fact that his own task force trans-fat Health Canada noted "there is no safe amount of trans consumption," and "the longer we wait , getting sick and even death will occur, so we knew we had to get it from our food supply. "But from the perspective of evidence-based, I am aware there is no strong evidence that would lead me to believe that we all have to drink several glasses of milk per day , vegetable oil must supply us each with a 15 percent to 25 percent of our total daily calories or non-natural trans-fats shouldn 't have to be completely avoided. If the goal is to protect the health guide and to reflect our best understanding of the impact of diet on chronic disease, the Guidelines total failure. Our guidelines remain deplorable saturated fat phobia; almost entirely ignorant of sugar; strange love with milk; less warning on processed meats, ultra-processed foods and eating out; and odd support the idea that juice and fruit is one in the same.

This position, while very friendly for Canadian agriculture, manufactured products and Canadian restaurant industry, does not serve the best interest of our health, and not serve to burden our country from the diet and weight-related illnesses.

When our guide when it was released in 2007, the Canadian Medical Association called for it to be revised on a regular basis - a policy that would be consistent with our neighbors to the south are by law back their national dietary guidelines every five years. And Americans do so with good reason. Nutritional science is a living, breathing, system checks, balances, criticism and questions changed. But here in Canada our national dietary recommendations is almost never changes. But they have to change. Recently both the World Health Organization and the Canadian Heart and Stroke Foundation fingered add sugar as a significant contributor to ill health and recommended strict limits placed on their consumption. Milk, while certainly a source of protein and calcium, has not been found to provide any extraordinary health benefits or risks, and as Canada does not need to be encouraged to go out of their way to make sure they consume or avoid it. Processed foods, more specifically ultra-processed foods, more and more convincingly associated with unhealthy eating patterns, and therefore our current best evidence would suggest they are explicitly discouraged. And non-natural trans-fats - never should have been on the menu even back in 2007.

We next Food Guide, if we ever get one, need to focus on the bigger picture. It needs to focus on our health rather than on nutrition and food industry and agricultural interests. Because regardless of the size of the industries that are stakeholders in the recommendations of the Guidelines, they pale in comparison to the impact of diet disease relatable and -responsive have Canadian health care spending. By definition, a kind of guide will be whole-style food guide, and one may be similar to the national dietary guidelines recently published by the Brazilian who enjoys international recognition hardware.

It took 15 years before Health Canada revised the 1992 Food Guide, and it has become eight years since the launch of our 2007 version. Canada decent guide evidence-based foods. We deserve one back with the launch in 2007, and we still deserve one day. From my point of view, however, I am not aware of any official energy, interest, or are planning to update the guide our current non-evidence-based in the near future.