On food stamps and still hungry

[maddezmom]

WASHINGTON, D.C. (CNNMoney.com) -- For Phyllis Bean, higher food prices mean going hungry so her 4-month-old baby girl can eat.

The Washington resident's $280 monthly food stamp allotment doesn't last very long these days, even though she gets a free lunch at a culinary training program at D.C. Central Kitchen. By mid-month, Bean is often reduced to eating canned ravioli and peanut butter and jelly so she can afford to buy milk and baby cereal for McKiya. By month's end, her refrigerator is empty.

"When I go to the counter, I have to put some of my food back so I can get her food," said Bean, 21. "I try to buy less meats and more starchy food that will last me - noodles, ravioli, rice, peanut butter and jelly."

Soaring food costs are putting a strain on many Americans' budgets. In the first three months of the year alone, they jumped 5.3%, and that's on top of a 4.9% increase in 2007.

more:http://money.cnn.com/2008/05/06/news/economy/foodstamps/index.htm?section=money_latest

[MountainLaurel]

1. Erm, isn't 4 months too early for cereal anyway?

I thought the standard was exclusively breastmilk/formula until 6 months?

But yeah, I get the general gist of her problem.

[xultar]

2. You can add a little cereal to the milk @ 4 months I think.

[Warpy]

7. You can stretch the formula with cooked cereal that early

but you're not doing the kiddo much of a favor. The cereal will shut them up, but that's about it.

Her problem is the canned ravioli and other convenience foods. They're packed with tons of salt and provide little real nutrition.

People in this country simply have not been taught how to get proper nutrition out of a poverty budget and if they want to stay healthy, they're going to have to learn.

A poverty diet is not fun, nor will it impress a gourmand. However, it is possible to make choices that will keep you healthy and active even on a food stamp budget. It really sucks to have to learn how to do it and it especially sucks to make the transition. Been there, done that.

The closer you are to the way the food looks when it left the field, the cheaper it is and the better the nutrition will be.

I get very angry when I hear about people like this because so many basic things are just not being taught, at home or in school, like balancing a check book and how to eat poor folk's food and stay healthy. It's not her fault, but I hope she will run into someone who will teach her sooner rather than later.

[FirstLight]

3. ...Can we also discuss the health issues faced by people...

If we have to get food from the food closet, it is usually hamburger helper, etc...high sodium, no whole grain, etc...

so I am a bad person and I must be eating good if I am overweight?
I am a burden to the healthcare system with my chronic inflammation and auto immune diseases...
because I have to eat crap to feed my kids the fresh vegies, etc...

this is a far bigger problem than we discuss.
Food crisis is being felt by the poor already, in SO many ways!


I know my son has a form of celiac disease, and I should be eating way differently to get my health in line...but we can't afford no wheat foods, etc...

so instead I am taking meds that kill my liver to keep my inflammation in check, and my son is diagnosed with ADD or ADHD and they want to give him meds at 4 years old

what's wrong with this picture?

ETA: hmmm, I guess the winner in that situation is the Drug companies, eh?
Also ; $280 a month for food for a mother & child is pretty hard core, and it may have been do-able five years ago, but I don't see that being viable today in the store when everything is doubled in cost from a year ago. I am shocked everytime I go into the main store, if we didn't have the grocery outlet, we'd be screwed!!!!

[maddezmom]

5. I'm sorry to hear about your health troubles

The whole system sucks. When I read this this am I was just sick to my stomach and reminded me of this article. It's all tied together. :(

Life Expectancy Drops for Some U.S. Women, Historic Reversal, in 1,000 Counties.....
Life Expectancy Drops for Some U.S. Women
Historic Reversal, in 1,000 Counties, Reflects Increase in Death From Certain Diseases

By David Brown
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, April 22, 2008; Page A01

For the first time since the Spanish influenza of 1918, life expectancy is falling for a significant number of American women.

In nearly 1,000 counties that together are home to about 12 percent of the nation's women, life expectancy is now shorter than it was in the early 1980s, according to a study published today.

The downward trend is evident in places in the Deep South, Appalachia, the lower Midwest and in one county in Maine. It is not limited to one race or ethnicity but it is more common in rural and low-income areas. The most dramatic change occurred in two areas in southwestern Virginia (Radford City and Pulaski County), where women's life expectancy has decreased by more than five years since 1983.

The trend appears to be driven by increases in death from diabetes, lung cancer, emphysema and kidney failure. It reflects the long-term consequences of smoking, a habit that women took up in large numbers decades after men did, and the slowing of the historic decline in heart disease deaths.

more: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=222&topic_id=34889

Wealth Lowers Stroke Risk, No Surprise
April 24, 2008 04:13 PM ET | Michelle Andrews | Permanent Link


Money can't buy you love or happiness, but it may protect you from having a stroke. That's the takeaway from a new study in the journal Stroke, released today. Researchers found that the least wealthy were three times more likely to have a stroke between ages 50 and 64 compared with those who were in the top 75th to 89th percentile in wealth (the very wealthiest outliers were excluded). Once people hit 65, however, all bets were off, and wealth no longer afforded them protection.

The study examined the effect of education, income (annual earnings), and wealth (all housing and financial assets) on nearly 20,000 participants in the ongoing University of Michigan Health and Retirement Study. It's the first study to find that wealth predicts stroke incidence independently of income and education, according to Mauricio Avendano, a research fellow in public health at the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam and coauthor of the study, in a press release announcing the findings.

Stroke is the third leading cause of death in the United States, striking some 780,000 people annually. The idea that people who are better off are less likely to have a stroke—however you define "better off"—doesn't set off any surprise bells. We know that people lower on the socioeconomic scale tend to smoke, be overweight, consume alcohol, and suffer from diabetes in greater numbers than those with more resources. These are all risk factors for stroke. Along similar lines, the study found that subjects ages 50 to 74 who had less income, wealth, or education had higher rates of high blood pressure, smoking, low physical activity, heart disease, diabetes and being overweight—stroke risk factors all.


more:http://www.usnews.com/blogs/on-health-and-money/2008/04/24/wealth-lowers-stroke-risk-no-surprise.html

Study spotlights bleak effects of poverty
Elizabeth Fernandez, Chronicle Staff Writer

Friday, April 18, 2008

(04-17) 21:37 PDT Oakland -- A black child in West Oakland is much more likely to be born prematurely and into poverty than a white child in the Oakland hills. In school, he's less likely to read at grade level and more likely to drop out.

As an adult, he's more prone to diabetes, heart disease, cancer or stroke. And he can expect to die nearly 15 years earlier.

Illustrating the profound societal impact of chronic poverty, a new report released Thursday by the Alameda County Public Health Department documents health disparities by neighborhood, income and race. It highlights a widening social, economic and health gap in the county - as poverty goes up, life expectancy goes down.

"The data are overwhelming," said Dr. Tony Iton, the county's public health director. "It is shocking. It is not unique to West Oakland. You see it in Bayview-Hunters Point, in Richmond, in Cleveland and Detroit."

A variety of factors, he said, affect whether a person thrives or doesn't - education, income, transportation, housing, criminal justice, air quality, exercise, access to nutritious food or health care. Toxic stressors such as poverty, racism and discrimination cause a cumulative physical impact "that affects the body over time and leads to fewer years of life," he said.

more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/04/18/MN8K107HDN.DTL

[FirstLight]

6. That last article hit home, literally..

I grew up in the Oakland hills in the early 70s...and was pretty healthy. At least we had a good family doctor, too...

then as an adult, I hit poverty, and my health and the health of my children is significanty worse off. Even though we no longer live in the city (which is a huge health burden in a different way.) we are still suffering from the effects of poverty and diet and healthcare.

you are right, it is all connected. Healthcare and poverty and diet and mental attitude and safety and addictions and abuse and all of it are so interwoven - no wonder the "fix" can't be limited to just one thing.

If I could only take the whole world in my arms and heal us all! :grouphug:

[Warpy]

8. I shared your condition, minus the kids

and I was declared uninsurable 20 years ago. My priorities ran to shelter, then meds, and food with what was left over.

I learned to love cabbage, turnips, parsnips, and other roots and cheap veggies. Some really awful veggies from my childhood turned nice when I'd roast them with a little tamari. Fruit? Forget it unless it was my birthday.

I learned how to do patties with cornmeal or whole millet instead of meat. I even learned to make my own soymilk and tofu. I sprouted everything I could and used it instead of lettuce on sandwiches.

None of my diet would impress gourmet cooks, but it kept me going when I was really, really poor. The transition was ugly and the diet was boring, but it kept me alive.

[grasswire]

11. here's a hug

I wish we lived closer together -- I'd adopt you. The more people who live together, the less each one pays to live.

[notadmblnd]

4. The Drs will tell you not to..... but I dont know a mother who didnt give their baby cereal at 4 mo

[newfie11]

9. I have 3 kids and none had cereal .

They also never had baby food. They ate what I ate. I didn't trust the companies that made the food.
Believe it or not they all survived and are very healthy adults today. Whatever did the human race do before we were all programed to feed babies only formula,cereal, and baby food?

[notadmblnd]

10. Ours also ate what we ate

in fact, when he went to solids, we actually chewed his food for him just like the birds do.