After the Senate buried provisions stripping food safety regulations in its emergency spending bill to end the forty-four-day government shutdown, the House followed suit and introduced additional clauses that would temporarily bar states from regulating which foods manufacturers can label “healthy” and suspend new listeria regulations for “low-risk ready-to-eat” foods, according to a Lever review of the legislation.
The move follows a multimillion-dollar lobbying blitz and pushback from companies and organizations that stand to benefit from the provisions. It also comes amid growing public concern over listeria outbreaks, including those linked to ready-to-eat foods that regulators generally consider low risk.
The House spending bill includes a provision, effective until 2028, that bars states from enacting their own labeling requirements for foods deemed “healthy,” such as restricting the definition to foods with limited amounts of saturated fats and added sugars. The provision also establishes a grace period for food companies to adopt new “healthy” food labeling changes.
The changes are a response to a Biden-era Food and Drug Administration (FDA) rule that updated the definition of “healthy” foods. The 2022 rule placed limits on the amount of saturated fats, cholesterol, sodium, and added sugars that can be found in foods labeled by their manufacturers as healthy. The final rule was implemented in 2024 with the hope that it “may result in lower incidence of diet-related chronic diseases, including cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes.”
Cereal companies General Mills, Kellogg’s, and Post Consumer Brands opposed the rule, claiming in a February 2023 letter to regulators that it would “disqualify many grain foods, including the overwhelming majority of the ready-to-eat cereals on the market, from using the term ‘healthy.’”
The Consumer Brands Association, a top food industry lobbying group, wrote in a…
Auteur: Freddy Brewster
