Strong nutrition standards for school meals, consistent with evidence-based recommendations, position children for optimal health and wellbeing. Strong science supports the link between lowering sodium intake and better health. This new issue brief from Healthy Eating Research examines the recent history of sodium standards for school meals. It highlights current sodium intake among America’s children and School Nutrition Meal Cost Study (SNMCS) findings about sodium content of school meals. The SNMCS examined sodium levels in school meals based on data from nationally representative samples of public school food authorities, schools, and students in school year 2014-2015. Findings indicate that there has been major progress in reducing the sodium content of school meals, but more progress is needed and attempts to weaken sodium standards compromise the health of children across the country.
Schools Find Success in Reducing Sodium in Meals
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