The Department of Health and Human Services sent a memo<\/a> to hospitals on March 30 urging them to align with the Department of Agriculture\u2019s new 2025-2030 dietary guidelines<\/a>, which emphasize limiting sugary, ultra-processed foods. <\/p>\n The agency wants hospitals to \u201calign their food purchases with the dietary guidelines in order to enjoy continued eligibility for Medicaid and Medicare payments,\u201d Kennedy said<\/a> at a press conference last month.<\/p>\n \u201cWe shouldn\u2019t be giving \u2026 people who are sick Jell-O and Cheerios and rubber chicken and sugar drinks,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n Officials have since threatened to withhold millions in crucial federal funding from healthcare facilities for violations, according to a KFF Health News report<\/a> published via CBS News. But experts said it\u2019s unclear how this could be enforced.<\/p>\n Dietitian and research scientist Kevin Klatt told the outlet: “Most of this is political theater. HHS doesn’t have the power to do much.\u201d<\/p>\n When reached for comment, HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon told The Independent: \u201cOn March 30th, CMS released a Conditions of Participation update to ensure patient food in hospitals adheres to the dietary guidelines.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNinety percent of healthcare expenditures are on chronic disease, and all stakeholders agree we should be serving patients suffering from these conditions’ healthy food. We commend the many hospitals who have made commitments to improve their food offerings and expect every hospital system to do so,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n Calley Means, one of Kennedy\u2019s top advisers, asked members of the public to report hospitals that serve sugary drinks earlier this month. His social media post included a link to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services website<\/a>, where users can submit complaints about healthcare facilities.<\/p>\n \u201cIf a hospital is serving patients sugary drinks, they are out of compliance with government standards and are putting their reimbursements in jeopardy,\u201d Means wrote<\/a> on April 1. \u201cIf you see patients being served sugary drinks, please post information below or let CMS know.\u201d<\/p>\n When KFF Health News contacted Means, he pointed the outlet to another X post he shared on April 17.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is very sad that Trump Derangement Syndrome is leading Democrats to defend the medical importance of mass serving soda and junk food to American patients – 94 percent of whom have signs of metabolic dysfunction,\u201d he wrote<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":565501,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[102,2960,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-565500","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-health","tag-healthcare","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/565500","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=565500"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/565500\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/565501"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=565500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=565500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=565500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Health](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/GettyImages-2220784713.jpg\")
Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said hospitals \u2018shouldn\u2019t be giving … people who are sick Jell-O\u2019 (Getty Images)<\/p>\n![\"HHS](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/2272588971.jpg\")
HHS is urging hospitals to \u2018align their food purchases with the dietary guidelines in order to enjoy continued eligibility for Medicaid and Medicare payments,\u2019 Kennedy said (Getty)<\/p>\n