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Friday, May 9, 2025

FDA and ������������ announce innovative joint Nutrition Regulatory Science Program

Today, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the National Institutes of Health (������������) announced a new, joint innovative research initiative that will serve as a key element in fulfilling U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s commitment to Make America Healthy Again. With diet-related chronic diseases continually rising, it is imperative that the FDA and ������������ work in lockstep to invest in gold standard science, prioritize a better understanding of the root causes to end the diet-related chronic disease crisis and safeguard the health of America’s children.

Under the new Nutrition Regulatory Science Program, the FDA and ������������ will implement and accelerate a comprehensive nutrition research agenda that will provide critical information to inform effective food and nutrition policy actions to help make Americans’ food and diets healthier. The initiative will aim to answer questions such as:

• How and why can ultra-processed foods harm people’s health?
• How might certain food additives affect metabolic health and possibly contribute to chronic disease?
• What is the role of maternal and infant dietary exposures on health outcomes across the lifespan, including autoimmune diseases?

Answering these questions and many others will enable effective policy development and help promote the radical transparency Americans deserve about the foods they are eating and how those foods can impact their health.

“The FDA is focusing resources on the greatest contributors to the staggering health care crisis: chronic diseases,” said FDA Commissioner Martin A. Makary, M.D., M.P.H, “Mirroring the highly successful FDA and ������������ Tobacco Regulatory Science Program, we’re bringing together scientific expertise from both agencies to transform nutrition and food-related research.”

The FDA will provide its critical expertise in regulatory science and ������������ will provide the infrastructure for the solicitation, review and management of scientific research. The initiative will bring together experts in many disciplines—including chronic disease, nutrition, toxicology, risk analysis, behavioral science, and chemistry—all with the goal to advance the gold standard of nutrition and food science. 

“Nutrition has always been a priority at ������������. By teaming up with the FDA, we’re taking a major step toward answering big questions about how food affects health—and turning that science into smarter, more effective policy. It’s time to tackle the chronic disease crisis head-on. That’s why ������������ is making this investment alongside the FDA,” said ������������ Director Jay Bhattacharya, M.D., Ph.D.

The FDA and ������������ will work together to develop a research agenda for the Nutrition Regulatory Science Program and are committed to ensuring all research conducted under the Program is fair, independent and free of conflicts of interest.

About the National Institutes of Health (������������): ������������, the nation's medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. ������������ is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about ������������ and its programs, visit www.nih.gov.

������������…Turning Discovery Into Health^®