Mary Hartley, RD, MPH, is the director of nutrition for Calorie Count, providing domain expertise on issues related to nutrition, weight loss and health. She creates original content for weekly blogs and newsletters, for the Calorie Count library, and for her popular daily Question-and-Answer section, Ask Mary. Ms. Hartley also furnishes direction for the site features and for product development.

UPDATE 1/31/2011: The 2010 Dietary Guidelines for Americans were released this morning. A full rundown on the changes can be found here.

The nutrition community has been expectantly waiting for the 2010 Dietary Guidelines, which at this point, are a month late in their release. The Guidelines contain the authoritative information about the best diet to prevent disease. Since 1980, they have been published every five years by law.

The Dietary Guidelines for Americans are jointly published by the Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). They are revised to reflect scientific advances in the knowledge of what constitutes an ideal diet. They are the basis of Federal nutrition education programs, including My Pyramid and the Nutrition Facts labels, and they guide the foods that are offered by School Lunch, WIC and other Federal nutrition programs.

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UPDATE [8/24/2011]: The USDA has rejected the proposal to ban soda purchases made with food stamps.

With obesity numbers skyrocketing and the associated medical costs out of control, New York City has decided to make a major change to their food stamp program. The program, now called SNAP (the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), serves more than 1.7 million New York City residents. City Health Commissioner Tom Farley and New York State Health Commissioner Richard Daines have asked the USDA for a food stamp waiver for two years during which recipients would not be allowed to use their food stamps to buy sodas.

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Have you ever thought about being a vegetarian? Would you consider it? You may after reading this story. The Department of Agriculture ordered the recall of 143 million pounds of beef in California due to a video that catches workers doing all kinds of cruel things to cows. While it would be nice to think that the agency is doing it for humane reasons, it’s actually because the behavior raises concerns of how improper handling may lead to possible disease, including mad cow.