内容摘要：It meant further postponing plans for a memorial service but Miller-Duffy agreed. Her request: That she gets to be there when her brother is finally disconnected from the ventilator.

It meant further postponing plans for a memorial service but Miller-Duffy agreed. Her request: That she gets to be there when her brother is finally disconnected from the ventilator.

But the steady flow of avocados has wound up helping, not hurting, their sales by allowing for a year-round supply to markets and restaurants that has fomented demand, farmers say. Before the influx, most American consumers considered avocados to be specialty items — and when they came into season in California, industry officials had to work to rev up widespread interest in order to sell them.Avocado consumption has been booming in the United States over the past two decades. The amount of fruit available per person tripled to more than 8 pounds (3.6 kilograms) between 2000 and 2021, federal statistics show. Avocado toast and guacamole are regular offerings not just in culinary hubs like NYC but at cafes around the Midwest and the South.

Andreas Tompros holds ripe avocados grown at his avocado farm, Ridgecrest Avocados, in Somis, Calif., on Thursday, May 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)Andreas Tompros holds ripe avocados grown at his avocado farm, Ridgecrest Avocados, in Somis, Calif., on Thursday, May 15, 2025. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)On a steep, sun-soaked hillside northwest of Los Angeles, Tompros is replanting nearly 300 avocado trees with the belief that Americans’ hunger for the fruit — and his orchard — will continue to grow.

“It will come back, and I believe it will become better than it was,” Tompros, who previously ran a software company in Hollywood, said of the orchard he took over five years ago in the tiny community of Somis.Avocado demand has also been buoyed by consumers’ growing interest in healthy fats, said Emiliano Escobedo, executive director of the Hass Avocado Board.

A 2000 U.S. law created the board that collected 2.5 cents for every pound (0.5 kilograms) of avocados imported or produced in the United States. The board used the money to market avocados and conduct nutritional research, an effort that has been widely credited with making the fruit ubiquitous in supermarkets and on restaurant menus.

“It’s been really wildly successful. It generates way more money than most of these other industry boards do,” said Richard Sexton, distinguished professor of agricultural and resource economics at the University of California, Davis. “When you look at the growth rate in avocado consumption relative to all fruits, the difference in growth rate is dramatic.”and promoting natural foods and lifestyle changes to reverse

, diabetes and other chronic diseases.If confirmed as surgeon general, Means would be tasked with helping promote

, which calls for removing thousands of additives and chemicals from U.S. foods, rooting out conflicts of interest at federal agencies and incentivizing healthier foods inand other nutrition programs.