More than 49 million people in the United States do not have regular access to nutritious meals, putting them at risk for a raft of physical, psychological and social problems, a report said Thursday. Nearly 15 percent of households in the United States, representing 49.1 million individuals, experienced food insecurity sometime during 2008, the report published in the Journal of the American Dietetic Association says.
With earlier studies showing that food insecurity is linked to poverty and worsens when the economy slows down, the report warned that the number of Americans who have trouble getting a nutritious meal is likely to rise. More than a third of the 17.3 million food-insecure people in the United States, including 1.1 million children, in 2008 lived in households where eating patterns were severely disrupted and food intake was greatly reduced. In those very food-insecure homes, parents - especially mothers - often "protect" their young children from hunger, opting to go without food themselves to allow their kids to eat, the report said.
Poor families, households with young children headed by a single parent of either sex, and black and Hispanic homes were at particular risk for food insecurity, according to the report. Problems linked to malnutrition include poor academic performance and a greater risk of chronic disease and even obesity, the report said.
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