The US Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee has recommended that limitations on dietary cholesterol be removed from the forthcoming 2015 edition of Dietary Guidelines for Americans in a draft report.

Since the 1960s Americans have been advised to limit dietary cholesterol, found in foods like eggs and prawns, by bodies such as the American Heart Association.

In the UK, all major UK heart and health advisory bodies, including the British Heart Foundation and the Department of Health, removed the previous limits on egg consumption due to their cholesterol content some years ago.

Over 30 years of prospective epidemiological surveys of coronary heart disease (CHD) risk have consistently found no independent relationship between dietary cholesterol or egg consumption and CHD risk. There is also strong evidence showing that the effects of cholesterol-rich foods on blood cholesterol are small and clinically insignificant in comparison with the effects of dietary saturated fatty acids.

The latest US report states: ”Cholesterol is not considered a nutrient of concern for over-consumption.”

The new guideline is expected to be published later this year by the US Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Agriculture.