Appendix A. Dietary Guidelines for Americans
U.S. Department of Agriculture and U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 2020-2025. 9th Edition. December 2020. Available at DietaryGuidelines.gov.
The 2020–2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans are designed for policymakers and nutrition and health professionals to help all individuals and their families consume a healthy, nutritionally adequate diet. The information in the Dietary Guidelines is used to develop, implement, and evaluate Federal food, nutrition, and health policies and programs. It also is the basis for Federal nutrition education materials designed for the public and for the nutrition education components of USDA and HHS nutrition programs.
The Guidelines provide four overarching Guidelines that encourage healthy eating patterns at each stage of life and recognize that individuals will need to make shifts in their food and beverage choices to achieve a healthy pattern. The Guidelines also explicitly emphasize that a healthy dietary pattern is not a rigid prescription. Rather, the Guidelines are a customizable framework of core elements within which individuals make tailored and affordable choices that meet their personal, cultural, and traditional preferences. For the first time, the Dietary Guidelines for Americans 2020-2025 provides recommendations for each life stage, from birth to older adulthood.
What is a dietary pattern? It is the combination of foods and beverages that constitutes an individual’s complete dietary intake over time. This may be a description of a customary way of eating or a description of a combination of foods recommended for consumption.
There are 4 Guidelines:
- Follow a healthy dietary pattern at every life stage.
- Customize and enjoy nutrient-dense food and beverage choices to reflect personal preferences, cultural traditions, and budgetary considerations.
- Focus on meeting food group needs with nutrient-dense foods and beverages, and stay within calorie limits.
- Limit foods and beverages higher in added sugars, saturated fat, and sodium, and limit alcoholic beverages.
- This fourth guideline includes quantitative recommendations on limits that are based on the body of science reviewed. These recommendations include:
- Limiting added sugars* to less than 10% of calories per day for ages 2 and older and to avoid added sugars for infants and toddlers.
- Limiting saturated fat to less than 10% of calories per day starting at age 2;
- Limiting sodium intake to less than 2,300mg per day (or even less if younger than 14);
- Limiting alcoholic beverages* (if consumed) to 2 drinks or less a day for men and 1 drink or less a day for women.
- This fourth guideline includes quantitative recommendations on limits that are based on the body of science reviewed. These recommendations include:
There are 3 Key Dietary Principles that can help people achieve the Dietary Guidelines. To help improve Americans’ eating patterns, the Dietary Guidelines suggests:
- Meet nutritional needs primarily from nutrient-dense foods and beverages.
- Choose a variety of options from each food group.
- Pay attention to portion size
* The Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 2020-2025 recommend limiting intakes of added sugars and alcoholic beverages, but do not include changes to quantitative recommendations from the 2015-2020 Dietary Guidelines for these two topics, because the new evidence reviewed since the 2015-2020 edition is not substantial enough to support changes to the quantitative recommendations for either added sugars or alcohol.