Hospital food rarely draws rave reviews. But efforts by the Trump administration to get hospitals to ditch unhealthy fare are facing criticism for going too far.
The Department of Health and Human Services sent notices to hospitals asking them to align their food purchases with the administration’s 2025-30 dietary guidelines to ensure continued eligibility for Medicaid and Medicare payments. “We commend the many hospitals who have made commitments to improve their food offerings, and expect every hospital system to do so,” HHS spokesperson Andrew Nixon said.
Top Kennedy adviser Calley Means took to social media to explain the initiative, urging the public to report hospitals that don’t comply with the guidance. The comment included a link to an HHS webpage with a toll-free number for reporting complaints typically used for medical bills.
The warnings drew sharp rebukes from critics who said the directive fails to consider that the specific dietary needs of patients are often different from those of the rest of the population.
“It’s always a struggle to get people to eat. Losing weight in the hospital raises the risk of mortality,” said Mary Talley Bowden, a sleep medicine specialist, who has often sided with Make America Healthy Again causes but criticized the administration’s call to report violations on X, posting: “Give me a break Calley. A hospital snitch line for soda?”
“It’s a little tyrannical,” she said in an interview.
HHS can withhold or threaten federal funding if hospitals violate mandatory minimum health and safety standards set by the agency. The standards stipulate that hospitals must protect patient privacy, for example, and uphold infection control.
The standards do address hospital food, but they don’t explicitly refer to the 2025-30 dietary guidelines established by the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
Rather, the standards require that “individual patient nutritional needs must be met in accordance with recognized dietary practices,” and list other requirements for hospitals, such as having access to a qualified dietitian.
HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “doesn’t have a legal basis to do this, but hospitals and nursing homes can’t afford to ignore it altogether because of what it signals about potential enforcement action,” said Nicholas Bagley, a University of Michigan law professor.
The backlash was immediate after the Trump administration served notice that hospitals and nursing homes should limit sugary drinks and dietary supplements in favor of what the Department of Health and Human Services terms “real food.”