You want them to get a heart attack instead? Lots of cultures have good breakfast that don't rely on sugar or cholesterol. Look to the Mediterranean/Middle East/Central Asia/Far East.
Also, "A landmark systematic review and meta-analysis of observational studies showed no association between saturated fat consumption and (1) all-cause mortality, (2) coronary heart disease (CHD), (3) CHD mortality, (4) ischaemic stroke or (5) type 2 diabetes in healthy adults.1 Similarly in the secondary prevention of CHD there is no benefit from reduced fat, including saturated fat, on myocardial infarction, cardiovascular or all-cause mortality.2 It is instructive to note that in an angiographic study of postmenopausal women with CHD, greater intake of saturated fat was associated with less progression of atherosclerosis whereas carbohydrate and polyunsaturated fat intake were associated with greater progression.3" [2]
There's plenty of evidence, however that sugar is a much more dangerous driver of CVD [3], which is obvious when you look at the pandemic levels of obesity and metabolic syndrome (and co-morbidity and lack of decline in CVD) that coincided with the demonization of saturated fats (and replacement with much worse trans-fats and high n6 PUFAS [4])...
[1] https://health.clevelandclinic.org/why-you-should-no-longer-...
[2] https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/51/15/1111
The problem with industries muddy the water by claiming “cholesterol” is bad without distinguishing between ldl and hdl. It’s similar to what the sugar industry does with “diabeties” when they don’t distinguish between type 1 and type 2.
Since then, and because the lipid hypothesis was deemed as institutional truth, we've been chasing a white rabbit that didn't exist. First it was saturated fats, then cholesterol, then LDL, now LP(a) and Ox-LDL... In the meantime, since saturated fat was public enemy number one, even worse replacements (trans-fats, industrial seed oils, even potentially worse and unstudied new FA isomers now) were introduced as replacements and sugar consumption increased dramatically from fat-phobia (as the defacto remaining macro as red meat and protein were also tarred with the same brush), leading to where we are now (a global metabolic disease pandemic).
What's interesting is in the past two decades especially, the amount of very interesting nutritional and metabolic research (biomechanistic research in animal models, RCTs and other human trials) has been staggering, and I think there's overwhelming evidence (and now some momentum even) in scientific/medical circles strongly pointing out that nutritional policies and "common wisdom" as being flat out wrong, but in the general public (which includes most medical practitioners, sadly) there's a huge lag. Which is too bad, considering obesity rates are likely above 40% in US adults now (39.8% in 2015-2016 [1]).
Then again, thinking back, we all drank chocolate milk in school, since you needed something to cover the awful taste of the underlying milk, so I guess I shouldn't be too surprised.
Let's not suggest that parents don't have almost complete control over their kids at this age.
I can reconcile your anecdote against how I was raised: My school didn't have free food, so I didn't have a choice and your scenario was impossible. I either ate breakfast and packed a lunch or went the day hungry. I preferred the former. My parents didn't buy poptarts. I had to learn to enjoy healthy food for breakfast and a ham sandwich for lunch, and I'm very thankful for that.
>I either ate breakfast and packed a lunch or went the day hungry.
Yes, a lot of kids will actually fast and make themselves ravenous, have blood sugar crashes, be unable to concentrate, act badly towards classmates, etc. rather than eat the food they don't prefer. Some will lose weight. One of mine in particular will fast for _days_ until eventually someone will feed him something sweet. It's a real problem. In his case he'll sometimes eat a dinner one day, then a week later refuse the same food, until we wear him down until he will finally take a bite, then he'll realize he likes it, and eat a full meal. If he is not actually with us, though, we can't force his behavior like that.
This is especially true of kids who are "on the autism spectrum," and I suspect that a lot of HN readers have kids on the spectrum, as I do.
We feed the kids the healthiest food we can at home, almost all the time except for occasional special occasions. But _other_ well-meaning people at churches, schools, playdates, etc. can really screw up the eating habits a parent tries to instill.
the advice is the same but if you believe it carries more weight coming from a pediatrician and father of 8...here is a link to Thornburg Pediatrics, I recommend signing up for their newsletter.
Dietary cholesterol’s role in heart attacks has been largely disproven, but “fake news” is malicious disinformation, not mistaken conclusions from flawed decades-old research.