Agricultural policy and societal factors influence patients’ ability to follow a healthy diet

•Cardiovascular and cardiometabolic diseases are largely preventable, and are propagated by a poor diet.•Poor diet may be due to a lack of supply and access to healthy foods, agricultural subsidies, and marketing.•Improving national dietary intake starts with enhancing dietary guidelines, enacting legislative changes to optimize agricultural subsidies and food advertising, and incentivizing a plant-forward diet.