Why RFK Jr. wants to return whole milk to schools

(CNN) — More than a decade after the Obama-era move to generally prohibit whole and 2% milk in schools as part of an effort to lower rates of obesity among children, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and some lawmakers are arguing for the beverage’s return.

Kennedy, secretary of the US Department of Health and Human Services, recently called the US Dietary Guidelines for Americans “antiquated” and said he’s pushing Head Start programs to switch from low-fat dairy to full-fat dairy, including whole milk.

The US Senate has also taken up the cause, with the Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition & Forestry holding a hearing Tuesday on the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act. The measure would allow higher-fat milks in school meal programs, in addition to fat-free (skim) and low-fat milk already required to be available for children over age 2. There’s a corresponding bill in the US House of Representatives. Both bills were introduced by Republican lawmakers in January but have bipartisan support.

“I think about whole milk growing up, where my grandparents delivered milk to us two or three times a week, and it was just part of our diet … and how important whole milk is,” Sen. Roger Marshall of Kansas, who introduced the Senate bill, said in the hearing. “The Make America Healthy Again movement, it’s about whole foods. And I think we could characterize whole milk as part of that MAHA movement, as well.”

The National Milk Producers Federation said it looks forward to working with lawmakers to get the legislation passed, saying it could increase student milk consumption, according to a news release.

Here’s what experts say about higher-fat milks and children’s health.

The federal role in your child’s lunch

The federal government plays a key role in what kids across the country are served for breakfast and lunch at school, and it can change based on shifts in the Dietary Guidelines for Americans.

Every five years, HHS and the US Department of Agriculture update the guidelines, which have recommended low- or fat-free dairy for those older than 2 for more than 40 years. The National School Lunch Program, which provides low-cost or free meals for students, is required to meet those guidelines in its regulations.

In an effort to reduce obesity and other health conditions among children, Congress passed the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act in 2010. It required schools to serve meals with less fat, sugar and sodium, and more protein, whole grains, fruits and vegetables.

As a result, the National School Lunch Program restricted milk options to flavored and unflavored skim and low-fat milk, effectively banning whole milk, with exceptions for children with proper documentation of certain medical situations, said Amy Reed, a registered dietitian nutritionist and spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics.

“If the child was underweight, the school would have to provide the higher-calorie milk,” Reed said. Similarly, for children with milk allergies, schools must provide an alternative milk.

The effect of milk on children’s health

These federal policies are centered around concerns about saturated fat, the consumption of which has been linked with cardiovascular disease and obesity.

Regardless of the differences in calories and fat, higher- and lower-fat milks have similar nutrient profiles, Reed said.

Whole milk has 3.25% to 3.5% milk fat, compared with 1% or 2% in low-fat milk and 0.5% in fat-free milk, according to the American Heart Association.

“All milk is fortified with vitamin D, and the vitamin D and the calcium work together to help with bone strength and help increase the absorption of both,” Reed added. “There’s also some presence of potassium and magnesium phosphorus, which are all other minerals known for bone health. The potassium and sodium can be thought to be working together to help with blood pressure when you’re talking about adults.”

As the dietary guidelines are being revised this year for the 2025-30 edition, the advisory committee has reviewed research on milk and human health and recommended sticking with the current guidance.

“There’s evidence to show that the (Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act) really did improve the quality of food that was provided to kids,” Reed said.

The dietary guidelines committee found limited evidence that higher-fat milk may be associated with health benefits for growth, body composition and obesity risk among children ages 2 through 5.

However, even though the committee said it didn’t find benefit or harm for older people, it also said it couldn’t draw conclusions due to “substantial concerns” about existing research — and that the evidence wasn’t sufficient to advise changing the current guidelines.

An argument for whole milk

The continuing recommendation from the federal government that full-fat dairy be avoided is a “very strange conclusion to me,” said cardiologist Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, director of the Food is Medicine Institute at Tufts University in Boston. “Expecting to prove a negative is a strange precedent.”

“We regulate saturated fat as a monolith, as though it’s all the same, but it’s not,” he added. “Different types of saturated fats have different molecular structures.”

Some studies have found that dairy fat is rich in medium-chain triglycerides, which may have metabolic benefits in terms of improvement of type 2 diabetes, Mozaffarian said.

There have also been studies linking consumption of dairy fat to a lower risk of cardiovascular disease. But that doesn’t mean all full-fat dairy products will reduce risk; some, such as milk and yogurt, have a neutral relationship to the disease.

“I think it’s actually strongly evidence-based to let whole milk not only get back to schools but get back on the tables and in glasses of Americans — not just whole milk but [also] whole-fat yogurt and whole-fat cheese,” Mozaffarian said.

“Not only is dairy fat not linked to any negative outcomes; dairy fat [is] also actually observationally linked to low risk of diabetes.”

Additionally, in the absence of whole milk, some children dislike the flavor of plain lower-fat milks and opt for chocolate- or strawberry-flavored lower-fat milks, which have more sugar, experts said.

Children need a well-balanced diet

Regardless of the type of fat children consume, Mozaffarian and Reed urged the importance of considering the overall diet, rather than individual ingredients. Like adults, children should have a diet with lots of fruits and vegetables, whole grains, lean meats and healthy fats.

That’s why Mozaffarian’s concerned about the lack of attention to ultraprocessed foods in schools and the federal government’s significant cuts to programs supplying fresh food to schools and food banks across the nation — while lawmakers consider legislation that would require higher-fat milks in schools for what they say are health reasons.

“We need more dollars to pay for healthy food for kids,” Mozaffarian said. “We’re giving kids the cheapest possible food in school and then paying for it 10 times over in health care spending. That’s just shortsighted.

“We should be doubling, tripling our investments in healthy food across the country, including schools.”

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