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CHILD HUNGER IN AMERICA
By Jack A. Smith
Recent studies conducted at Cornell University demonstrate that “hunger and poverty in the United States are severe enough to significantly impair the academic and psycho-social development of school-age children and adolescents,” according to information released to the general public April 25. In other new research sponsored by Boston University and made public May 7, the decline in U.S. welfare benefits and the deteriorating economy are reported to be causing further increases in the number of hungry and malnourished children.
Nearly 20% of America’s children exist at or below the official poverty line. A segment of this destitute community -- amounting to four million children -- “live in homes where at times, due to lack of economic resources, there is not enough food,” according to the Cornell studies. One study links hunger with the cognitive, academic and psycho-social development of school-age children. The other examines how hunger is linked to depression and suicide attempts among adolescents. The Cornell studies have been published recently in the Journal of Nutrition and in the journal Pediatrics. The Boston University study of clinic admissions was released at a medical conference in Baltimore.
"The level of food deprivation in this wealthy nation puts millions of children at risk for multiple developmental problems," says Katherine Alaimo, a community health scholar now at the University of Michigan, who contributed to the findings. "Food is fundamental and food insufficiency, like other material deprivations such as homelessness, is stressful for both parents and children and can cause depression, anxiety and other emotional problems.”
The Cornell researchers found that “young people, ages 15 to 16, in homes where there is not always enough to eat, are five times more likely to attempt suicide, compared with well-fed adolescents. They also are four times more likely to suffer from chronic, low-grade depression (dysthymia), which is a high-risk factor for major depression, are almost twice as likely to have been suspended from school, and have more problems getting along with their peers. Young people, ages 6 to 11, who live in families without enough food are twice as likely to have seen a psychologist, 1.4 times more likely to have repeated a grade and to have significantly lower math scores.”
The Boston University study, found that there has been “a 45% increase in the ranks of hungry children” treated at the Boston Medical Center and at a large medical clinic in Minneapolis from 1999 to 2001. The Boston Globe reported “researches found that the percentage of hungry children coming into Boston Medical and the Minneapolis clinic rose from 9% of all infants and toddlers to 14% during the two years studies.”
This study of 3,000 children has a national application. The two medical facilities were selected for investigation because they are located in states that are judged to have retained relatively adequate social service programs. “If the status of children in those states is deteriorating,” the Boston newspaper explained, “those findings could act as a warning of more severe problems in other states.”
According to Boston Medical Center social worker Patience Sampson, “We have a lot of kids that look like skin and bones.” She attributed the nutritional decline to the increasing number of families lacking funds to purchase sufficient food, those ruled ineligible for food stamps or who are kept ignorant that they qualify, and to the fact that many “parents are spending so much time working multiple jobs that they can’t prepare nutritionally balanced meals, opting instead for fast food.”
Dr. Deborah Frank, the Boston University physician who directed the study, commented that the findings “should be a wake-up call to people. This says there are canaries in our social mine,” suggesting that welfare cutbacks and the weak economy are creating havoc for the poor. “We should scrutinize what we are doing to our children,” she concluded.
Christine Olson, a Cornell nutritional sciences professor engaged in research for the academic and psycho-social study of school children, pointed out that "Unlike many other factors that contribute to psychological, developmental or social problems, this one [hunger] is fairly straightforward to address. We need public policies that ensure that families have access to enough nutritionally adequate and safe food for an active healthy life."
At present, however, federal food programs are suffering from cutbacks due to the government decision to “end welfare as we know it,” and private voluntary food distribution agencies are reporting that demand for food exceeds supplies to the extent that many poor people are being turned away. The Bush administration’s welfare reform proposals and social programs contain nothing to address these problems. Meanwhile, President Bush recently asked Congress for an additional $27.1 billion in immediate funding to pursue the war on terrorism. This is unrelated to the $48 billion increase in the 2003 Pentagon budget, which will bring total military spending to almost $400 billion. (end)