The U.S. Department of Agriculture and Department of Health and Human Services has just released the latest draft for the country's dietary guidelines.
But, only less than a day after its release, a group of vegan advocates immediately sued the government over one of the revisions made in the draft.
As noted by Ars Technica, not much has changed in the latest version of the guidelines except for the addition of new conditions set for certain dietary subjects such as sugar and cholesterol.
Before, previous guidelines didn't have limits for sugar intake. Instead, the U.S. government only advised the public to refrain from eating too much sugar. But now, people are strongly advised to limit their sugar consumption by only eating 10 of their total daily calories. This is almost equal to drinking one can of sweetened soda a day.
Another major revision made in the new dietary guidelines is related to the government's stance on cholesterol, or eggs in particular. Previously, people are told not to go beyond the 300-milligram limit for dietary cholesterol, which can be easily maxed out by eating two eggs a day.
But in the latest draft, this limit has been scrapped. Instead, eggs have been included as one of the sources of protein.
Dietician Lisa Drayer explained to CNN that although egg yolks contain high levels of cholesterol, they are not high in saturated fat. Also, previous studies have already revealed that unlike saturated fat, consuming eggs doesn't increase one's cholesterol level.
"If you connect the dots together scientifically, we don't believe there is a strong influence between dietary cholesterol and blood cholesterol," she said. "Even when I was training to be a dietician, we knew eating eggs didn't increase your cholesterol as much as saturated fat does."
"So the government advice is catching up to the science," Drayer added.
Of course, even without a limit, people are still advised to control the number of eggs they eat every day.
Although egg lovers might be rejoicing over the removal of the limit on their favorite food item, other groups, however, are not happy about it. One of these is the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, an organization that strong supports a vegan diet, according to Gizmodo.
Within hours after the new dietary guidelines were released to the public, this group immediately filed a lawsuit against the government. It maintained that the 300-milligram limit on eggs should still be imposed. In addition, the group alleged that the government committee responsible for drafting the guidelines may have been swayed by members of the egg industry to reverse their stance on the consumption of this item.
