Kody Hanner
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The Devastating Consequences of Americans Neglecting Nutrient-Dense Foods
The lack of nutrient-dense foods in American diets has shown to be detrimental to our health as a nation. This is shown through the rise in chronic illnesses, obesity, malnutrition, and nutrition-based behavioral and neurological disorders. There is much debate as to why or how we have landed here, but there is a variety of players that actively contribute to the problem.
As a millennial (or possibly a late Gen X) consumer, I can wholeheartedly say that the marketing and education surrounding food is powerful and, most importantly, misleading. The reason I even bring generation into this conversation is that we were perfectly placed behind the baby boomers, who were originally sold convenience, and the beginning of Generation X, who was sold “health” foods. Our childhoods were cram-packed with convenient, “healthy” foods that we packed in our lunch boxes, made for ourselves after school, and our moms microwaved when they came home after a long day of work. Did I mention that moms were able to go into the workforce because they had all the great appliances that made their lives so much easier? Surprise, surprise, the only way to afford the fancy appliances is for them to enter the workforce.
What is the consequence of not eating nutrient-dense foods?
Now, my generation (and the ones following) is sick. We have inflammatory issues and autoimmune diseases, we are obese and diabetic, we are on anxiety medications, you name it, we probably have it in record numbers! We are tired of being sick, overweight, exhausted, and so much more, but we were programmed to blindly believe in modern medicine. Don’t prevent it, live whatever life you want, because we have a pill for the consequences!
But they messed up… they hurt our kids. Modern food and medicine have made us infertile or have caused our kids to have autism, ADHD, and a host of other diseases. Our children have intolerances to so many foods that I am not sure how some of them are nourished at all. And the more we knock on modern medicine’s door, the sicker they get.
That realization of how modern food and medicine were making us sick, was coming to a head at the exact same time as the pandemic. COVID woke the nation up, dropping the rates of public faith in our health system to below one-third (source linked below) after certain members of the government released documentation stating that they had lied about multiple aspects of this health “crisis.”
What happens now?
This has led to a grassroots movement from moms-up that is beginning to highlight the depths of food corruption and even making policy changes. Learn more about this in my podcast episode asking, Why we should boycott boxtops? The largest shift came in the 2024 election of Donald Trump with the choice to put Robert F. Kennedy Jr. in as the head of Health and Human Services. RFK Jr, has stated that his entire mission is to Make America Healthy Again, and let’s face it, we are here for it!
On Feb 13, 2025, President Trump signed an executive order establishing the Make America Healthy Again Commission, in reflection of RFK, Jr’s platform.
The order does a few things:
- Investigate and address the root cause of America’s escalating health crisis (with a focus on childhood chronic disease).
- It has 100 to produce this assessment of questions regarding childhood diseases (including international comparisons)
- Then, it has 180 days to produce a strategy based on the findings
The commission will do this by focusing on:
- Empowering Americans through transparency
- Implement gold-standard research funded by the federal government (not private companies)
- Work with farmers to provide healthy, abundant, and affordable food
- Include flexibility for lifestyle and disease prevention to health coverage
I strongly suggest going and reading the research statistics that are included in the above-linked fact sheet. You will most likely find them eye-opening.
What does this mean for nutrient-dense foods?
For starters, this means that a lot of foods that were once believed to be “healthy” are going to be exposed for what they really are, bought, and paid for federal marketing in the form of nutrition education. The layers and deep dives that are going to be found is going to change the way we eat drastically. This is primarily going to come from the focus on what farmers are providing. Below I am going to outline a few that explain them. Unfortunately, one article could never dissect the broken system that feeds us.
- Farmers are growing what makes them an income, not what Americans should be eating. This isn’t at any fault to the farmer because there is not a direct correlation between what they are growing and what people eat. In addition to this, a farmer growing wheat currently gets a supplemental income in the form of subsidy payments and crop insurance allotted to them in the farm bill. Less than 0.01% of the farm bill goes to regenerative agriculture through the SARE program. Plus, wheat does not have a direct line to the customer. Wheat goes to many different products, such as:
- Flour for breads
- Flour for unhealthy, nutrient-empty food
- Ethanol production
- Animal feed
- Skincare products
- Paper
- Insulation
- Bioplastics
- Cleaning products
- And, a lot more!
- 75% of the Farm Bill funding goes towards nutrition. That sounds great when we are discussing pursuing healthier foods. However, the nutrition programs are welfare programs like food stamps and WIC (Women Infants Children). The only educational funding that is provided through these programs are directly to the recipients of the aid. There are no programs to proactively teach people about the foods that are good for them. In fact, this program pays for large amounts of items that are so far nutritious that it can’t even be blamed on their self-proclaimed failure to educate food stamp recipients to buy appropriate foods. SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) recipients are actually less likely than non-SNAP households to purchase nutrient-dense foods with sweetened drinks (ie. soda, not juice) coming in second to meats and costing taxpayers $608.7 million.
- Society has been stripped of its skill or desire to prepare or consume nutrient-dense and healthy food. There are Organizations like the Weston A Price Foundation that are devoted to teaching people how to eat properly and in ways that our bodies effectively digest. This program is fiercely against the USDA food pyramid that has plagued us for generations! I personally have been a victim of this nutritional disaster as I have chased what I was told to be healthy food in a yo-yo diet of artificial sugars and chemical proteins. At this point in life, I may never shed some of the weight, but over the last several years, I have watched my labs, skin, and body feel better than they ever have before.
My hopes for a movement toward nutrient education
I would love to see the USDA update its food pyramid to reflect the foods that feed our bodies properly. This will show everyone that changes are coming and how to approach them. However, where the biggest changes are going to come is through youth education. I am not talking about a flyer at an elementary school once a quarter that tells kids to drink their milk. It needs to be regular daily changes to expose children to real food, especially middle and high-school-aged kids who will actually be able to use the skills to shop, grow, and feed themselves.
Understandably, there are more government subsidies for grains because they store well and are at the core of many other foods. However, they should not be the base of all our nutrition unless it is in the form of high-protein animal-based protein. There should be subsidies for more fresh food, making it less expensive for the consumer and, therefore, more desirable than high-sugar foods.
I would also like more people to be taught and/or incentivized to grow and preserve their own food. This will take pressure off the farmers to be able to pursue more sustainable practices or farm products other than grains. You can read more about the logistics of this in another article that wrote about reducing pressure on farmers.
I have a goal and desire to reach a whole generation of children! Please follow to help me reach the goal of educating about real food and farming. Also, all podcast advertising sponsorships will go directly to the creation of educational materials, costs for me to teach in-person events, and administration of outreach!