School Meal Nutrition Standards Reduce Disparities Across Income and Race/Ethnicity.

Publisher: Elsevier Science Country of Publication: Netherlands NLM ID: 8704773 Publication Model: Print-Electronic Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1873-2607 (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 07493797 NLM ISO Abbreviation: Am J Prev Med Subsets: MEDLINE

Publication: Amsterdam : Elsevier Science
Original Publication: [New York, NY] : Oxford University Press, [c1985-

Food Services*/standards ; Food Services*/statistics & numerical data ; Income* ; Nutrition Policy* ; Schools*; Adolescent ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; Female ; Humans ; Male ; Diet, Healthy/standards ; Ethnicity ; Nutrition Surveys ; United States ; Racial Groups

Introduction: Children's diets in the U.S. typically fail to meet dietary recommendations, contributing to associated adverse health outcomes. The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act (HHFKA) of 2010 required the U.S. government to update nutrition standards for school meals to align with the Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGAs). This study estimates the evolving impact of substituting school-prepared food for home-prepared food on overall daily diet quality and by subcomponents of diet quality. Subgroup analyses are performed by race/ethnicity and income.
Methods: Two, nonconsecutive days of dietary recall data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (2005-March 2020) are used to calculate schoolchildren's Healthy Eating Index (HEI)-2020 scores. The study includes children with complete two-day dietary intakes who attend kindergarten through twelfth grade in a school offering lunch. An individual-level fixed effects regression is employed to examine the relationship of school food consumption on HEI-2020 scores before and after HHFKA-mandated changes in nutrition standards. Analyses were conducted on September 23, 2023.
Results: Prior to changes in standards (2005-2008), school food did not impact diet quality within the overall group of children. In 2009-2012, positive associations between school food and diet quality emerged for low-income students and for non-Hispanic Black students. By 2013-2020, improvements were seen across all groups. The association between school food and diet quality was most attributable to more favorable consumption of dairy, fruit, whole grains, refined grains, added sugars and saturated fats.
Conclusions: HHFKA-based nutrition standards were associated with beneficial dietary changes and reduced dietary disparities for children across diverse backgrounds.
(Copyright © 2024 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Date Created: 20240323 Date Completed: 20240720 Latest Revision: 20240821

20240822

10.1016/j.amepre.2024.03.012

38521131