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• Higher-income countries exhibit better scores for healthy dietary components, such as fruit and whole grains, but worse scores for unhealthy components, such as red/processed meats and sodium, compared to lower-income countries.
• Experts recommend changing eating patterns by making gradual shifts, such as increasing whole grains to add fiber, reducing processed food, and substituting red meat with fish, chicken, or plant proteins like beans.
• Higher education was generally linked to greater consumption of fruits, non-starchy vegetables, whole grains, and plant oils, but not always to lower consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) and red/processed meat.
• To improve population health, policy measures should support increased intake of health-promoting foods such as fruits, vegetables, whole grains, legumes, and nuts/seeds, while reducing the intake of unhealthy foods such as red meat, processed meat, and sugary beverages.
• Globally, between 1990 and 2018, AHEI scores increased for non-starchy vegetables (+1.1), legumes/nuts (+1.1), and fruit (+0.1); decreased for red/processed meat (−1.4), sugar-sweetened beverages (−0.6), and sodium (−0.4); and remained stable for whole grains (+0.1), PUFAs (0), and seafood omega-3 (0).
• Diets globally continue to lack sufficient amounts of fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, and whole grains, while including excessive and sometimes rising amounts of red meat, processed meat, and sugary drinks.
• Risks related to dietary composition in the 2021 Global Nutrition Report analysis included low intake of fruits (2.8 million deaths), whole grains (2.3 million), vegetables (1.7 million), legumes (1.5 million), nuts and seeds (1.0 million), and high intake of red meat (980,000), processed meat (880,000), and sugar-sweetened beverages (290,000).
• Suboptimal diets are characterized by low intake of fibers, fruits, vegetables, legumes, whole grains, nuts, seeds, milk, seafood, calcium, and healthy fats (omega-3 fatty acids, polyunsaturated fatty acids) and high intake of trans-fatty acids, sodium, red or processed meat, and sugar-sweetened beverages, according to Afshin et al. (2019).
• In high-income countries, Central/Eastern Europe, Central Asia, the Middle East, and Northern Africa, improvements in dietary quality driven by increased intake of fruit, non-starchy vegetables, legumes/nuts, and whole grains have been offset by stable or only minor reductions in red/processed meats, sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs), and sodium.
• South Asia exhibits relatively high diet diversity due to high consumption of whole grains and low intake of sugar-sweetened beverages and red/processed meat.
• A healthy diet consists of plenty of fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, seeds, whole grains, and oils high in unsaturated fats, while containing little to no red and processed meat, sugar-sweetened beverages, refined grains, and oils high in saturated fats.
• The planetary health diet prioritizes the consumption of vegetables, fruits, legumes, whole grains, nuts, and fish, while limiting the intake of red meat and tubers, and promoting moderate consumption of eggs, poultry, and dairy products.
• Imbalanced diets low in fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, seeds, and whole grains, and high in red and processed meat are responsible for one of the greatest health burdens globally and in most regions.
• Globally, urban residents had higher AHEI scores for fruit (+0.2) and whole grains (+0.2), but lower scores for sugar-sweetened beverages (-0.5), red/processed meat (-0.4), and legumes/nuts (-0.1).
• The EAT-Lancet Commission on Healthy Diets from Sustainable Food Systems established specific dietary recommendations for minimum intake of health-promoting foods (fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts, whole grains) and maximum intake of foods with detrimental health or environmental impacts (red meat, processed meat, dairy, fish).
• Plant-based diets are characterized by a high intake of vegetables, fruits, whole grains, legumes, and nuts, while minimizing or excluding animal products like red meat, fish, and dairy. This dietary pattern is high in fiber and nutrients and may support heart health, blood sugar management, and overall well-being.
• The Western pattern diet is rich in red meat, dairy products, processed and artificially sweetened foods, and salt, with minimal intake of fruits, vegetables, fish, legumes, and whole grains.
• A quarter of all deaths among adults globally are attributable to poor diets, defined as diets low in fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, and whole grains, and high in red meat, processed meat, and sugary drinks.
• The Global Nutrition Report 2021 analysis includes diet-disease associations for low intake of fruits, vegetables, legumes, nuts/seeds, and whole grains, as well as for high intake of red meat, processed meat, and sugary drinks.