Ice cream is going to remain filled with sugar and calories but it will soon lose artificial colors from dyes.

More than 40 companies — which produce about 90 percent of the nation’s ice cream — are making the so-called ice cream commitment to eliminate the use of certified artificial colors in their ice cream and frozen dairy desserts, the health and human services secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the agriculture secretary, Brooke Rollins, and the International Dairy Foods Association announced Monday.  The companies will replace artificial colors Red 3, Red 40, Green 3, Blue 1, Blue 2, Yellow 5, and Yellow 6 by the end of 2027.

The average American gobbles down about 19 pounds of ice cream a year, according to the industry. Confessing that ice cream is his favorite food, Mr. Kennedy said the initiative does not apply to products made with non-dairy ingredients or those made in-house by small ice cream shops or restaurants.

While the Food and Drug Administration still deems certified artificial colors safe for use in foods, the dairy industry says that it will be easier to avoid future regulatory problems by simply removing the dyes now. 

Mr. Kennedy is encouraging states to pass healthier food regulations as part of his Make America Healthy Again platform. West Virginia has already passed a law phasing out the dyes’ use and several more states are banning them from school foods.

He has also prioritized working with the food industry to phase out the use of all synthetic, petroleum-based dyes from the nation’s food supply.

“We can’t make MAHA succeed without the partnership of the American farmer,” Mr. Kennedy says. “Our job is to help them open the doors to make sure they have adequate resources in their supply chain.”

Mr. Kennedy says it is important to give approvals quickly for new chemical-free colors. On Monday, the Food and Drug Administration said it has approved the use of the color gardenia blue in foods. Gardenia blue is derived from the fruit of the gardenia, a flowering evergreen. The administration approved the color additive for use in sports drinks, flavored or enhanced non-carbonated water, fruit drinks, ready-to-drink teas, hard candy, and soft candy.

It is the fourth color derived from natural sources the administration has accepted in the past two months.

On a separate issue Monday, Mr. Kennedy disputed a claim by Senator Schumer that a public health emergency declaration is needed due to a widespread measles outbreak. Cases are at their highest level since the disease was considered eliminated in America a quarter century ago.

Mr. Schumer claims Mr. Kennedy’s long-held vaccine skepticism has helped fuel the spread of about 1,300 cases this year. “You pushed Vitamin A instead of vaccines, and days after finally acknowledging that the MMR vaccine prevents measles, you returned to sowing doubt about autism — a dangerous, long-debunked conspiracy theory,” Mr. Schumer wrote in a letter to the secretary.

Mr. Kennedy acknowledged that most of the cases in America are among people who have not been immunized but says the government is working to treat them. He added that the number of cases per capita in America is much lower than in Mexico and Canada. 

“We’ve done a very, very good job at controlling it. Of all of the places that have outbreaks, the outbreaks are actually declining,” Mr. Kennedy said. “We don’t, at this point, consider it a national emergency.”