The Public Health Effects Of Food Deserts

In the United States, people living in low-income neighborhoods frequently do not have access to affordable healthy food venues, such as supermarkets. Instead, those living in "food deserts" must rely on convenience stores and small neighborhood stores that offer few, if any, healthy food choices, such as fruits and vegetables. The Institute of Medicine (IOM) and National Research Council (NRC) convened a two-day workshop on January 26-27, 2009, to provide input into a Congressionally-mandated food deserts study by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Service. The workshop, summarized in this volume, provided a forum in which to discuss the public health effects of food deserts.

In the United States, people living in low-income neighborhoods frequently do not have access to affordable healthy food venues, such as supermarkets. Instead, those living in "food deserts" must rely on convenience stores and small neighborhood stores that offer few, if any, healthy food choices, such as fruits and vegetables. The Institute of Medicine (IOM) and National Research Council (NRC) convened a two-day workshop on January 26-27, 2009, to provide input into a Congressionally-mandated food deserts study by the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic Research Service. The workshop, summarized in this volume, provided a forum in which to discuss the public health effects of food deserts.

The Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008 directed the U.S. Dept. of Agr. to conduct a 1-year study to assess the extent of areas with limited access to affordable and nutritious food, identify characteristics and causes of such areas, consider how limited access affects local populations, and outline recommend. to address the problem. This report presents the findings of the study, which include results from two conferences of national and internat. authorities on food deserts and a set of research studies. It also includes reviews of existing literature, a national-level assessment of access to large grocery stores and supermarkets, analysis of the economic and public health effects of limited access, and a discussion of existing policy interventions. Illus.

The consumption and distribution of food, as well as its production, has become a major public policy issue over the past few decades; what we eat is no longer merely a private matter but carries significant externalities for wider society. Its increasing significance within the public arena implies a dissonance regarding the boundaries of food; where do we draw the line between food as private and food as public? What are the rights of society to impinge upon individual food consumption, and what conflicts will ensue when this boundary is disputed? The Consuming Geographies of Food explores these multiple issues of food across different regions of the world from the consumer’s perspective. It uniquely explicates the factors that lead customers towards certain typologies of consumption and towards certain types of retailing, offering a comprehensive review of the obesity problem, the phenomenon of food deserts and the issue of exclusion from a healthy diet. It then considers the effects of food on the consumer, the dynamic relationship between food and people, and the issue of food exclusion before concluding with possible futures for food consumption, from low-technology projects to high-technology scenarios. Based on original research into food access, ethics and consumption in both developed and less-developed countries this book will be of interest to students, researchers and academics in the fields of geography, economics, hospitality health, marketing, nutrition and sociology.

In the United States, some populations suffer from far greater disparities in health than others. Those disparities are caused not only by fundamental differences in health status across segments of the population, but also because of inequities in factors that impact health status, so-called determinants of health. Only part of an individual's health status depends on his or her behavior and choice; community-wide problems like poverty, unemployment, poor education, inadequate housing, poor public transportation, interpersonal violence, and decaying neighborhoods also contribute to health inequities, as well as the historic and ongoing interplay of structures, policies, and norms that shape lives. When these factors are not optimal in a community, it does not mean they are intractable: such inequities can be mitigated by social policies that can shape health in powerful ways. Communities in Action: Pathways to Health Equity seeks to delineate the causes of and the solutions to health inequities in the United States. This report focuses on what communities can do to promote health equity, what actions are needed by the many and varied stakeholders that are part of communities or support them, as well as the root causes and structural barriers that need to be overcome.

Introd. -- Literature -- Method for defining and measuring food deserts -- Descriptive analyses -- Results: comparing food desert tracts with all other tracts -- Changes in food desert tract characteristics over time -- Regression analysis: methodology -- Conclusion -- References.

Considering the detrimental environmental impact of current food systems, and the concerns raised about their sustainability, there is an urgent need to promote diets that are healthy and have low environmental impacts. These diets also need to be socio-culturally acceptable and economically accessible for all. Acknowledging the existence of diverging views on the concepts of sustainable diets and healthy diets, countries have requested guidance from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and the World Health Organization (WHO) on what constitutes sustainable healthy diets. These guiding principles take a holistic approach to diets; they consider international nutrition recommendations; the environmental cost of food production and consumption; and the adaptability to local social, cultural and economic contexts. This publication aims to support the efforts of countries as they work to transform food systems to deliver on sustainable healthy diets, contributing to the achievement of the SDGs at country level, especially Goals 1 (No Poverty), 2 (Zero Hunger), 3 (Good Health and Well-Being), 4 (Quality Education), 5 (Gender Equality) and 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production) and 13 (Climate Action).

With U.S. health care costs projected to grow at an average rate of 5.5 percent per year from 2018 to 2027, or 0.8 percentage points faster than the gross domestic product, and reach nearly $6.0 trillion per year by 2027, policy makers and a wide range of stakeholders are searching for plausible actions the nation can take to slow this rise and keep health expenditures from consuming an ever greater portion of U.S. economic output. While health care services are essential to heath, there is growing recognition that social determinants of health are important influences on population health. Supporting this idea are estimates that while health care accounts for some 10 to 20 percent of the determinants of health, socioeconomic factors and factors related to the physical environment are estimated to account for up to 50 percent of the determinants of health. Challenges related to the social determinants of health at the individual level include housing insecurity and poor housing quality, food insecurity, limitations in access to transportation, and lack of social support. These social needs affect access to care and health care utilization as well as health outcomes. Health care systems have begun exploring ways to address non-medical, health-related social needs as a way to reduce health care costs. To explore the potential effect of addressing non-medical health-related social needs on improving population health and reducing health care spending in a value-driven health care delivery system, the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine held a full-day public workshop titled Investing in Interventions that Address Non-Medical, Health-Related Social Needs on April 26, 2019, in Washington, DC. The objectives of the workshop were to explore effective practices and the supporting evidence base for addressing the non-medical health-related social needs of individuals, such as housing and food insecurities; review assessments of return on investment (ROI) for payers, healthy systems, and communities; and identify gaps and opportunities for research and steps that could help to further the understanding of the ROI on addressing non-medical health-related social needs. This publication summarizes the presentations and discussions from the workshop.