If the federal government shutdown
continues, food assistance programs
in Wisconsin could run short of
funds by next month.
FoodShare serves more than 700,000
people in Wisconsin, with the
average monthly benefit of about
$160.
The State Health Department is now
asking the legislature to approve
nearly $70 million to
cover federal cuts and
add staff to administer new
eligibility requirements.
This potential funding cliff could
hurt people who depend on
the assistance.
We turn to Dr. Dipesh
Navsaria, a physician member
of the Wisconsin Medical Society and
policy chair of the the Wisconsin
chapter of the American Academy
of Pediatrics.
And doctor, thanks very much for
being here.
Thanks for having me.
As a pediatrician, how do you
see the importance of food share
assistance?
It's something that's absolutely
critical to families.
I mean, to put it simply, right,
hungry family members is just not
a good thing.
It's not good for adults, it's not
for children, and having
adequate nutrition is important for
everything else we do in our lives.
Learning, working,
enjoying time with one another, all
of these things are much harder to
do if you don't have adequate
nutrition. So when we see challenges
to programs like FoodShare,
which is also known as SNAP at the
federal level.
We see that it creates all sorts
of ripple effects that we'll end up
paying for in other ways.
Does $160 a
month stretch far enough to
provide nutrition for families?
Oh, it never does.
So the SNAP program, as it's
known federally, which is the
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance
Program, I want to highlight the
word supplemental.
It's not meant to provide all
nutrition for family's
needs. It's meant to assist
with it.
But it does make a difference.
You spoke to this, but how important
is access to healthy food
in combating chronic illness or
child development?
We know that many things
go into child development
in terms of staying healthy and so
on. One of them is having all the
building blocks. I mean, nutrition
is how we take in sources
of energy and the building block
for our brains and for our bodies
to be able to do all the things we
do.
There's actually some great research
that was done some time ago, it's
well known, showing that
when you timed the
standardized testing in elementary
school kids, where in the months
that was mattered as to
whether the children were hungry or
not, right?
So just, did they have adequate
food in the home actually affected
their test scores significantly?
We've seen many, many studies
showing these sorts of things.
Does food insecurity also affect
children's mental health?
Of course, the way
of thinking of scarcity,
right, will I have enough to eat
when I go home?
The panic that many families would
have thinking about summer before
summer programs were introduced for
school lunch and so on,
it can really create
a huge challenge for children.
Will I have to eat?
Do I know where I'm gonna be able
to eat tonight?
And it can create this mindset
that's always worried about
not having enough.
Do your patients regularly say they
are food insecure and is that
growing?
It is certainly growing, and
the reason they say it is because in
health care we've become much better
about asking.
As you can imagine, there's often a
stigma, right, of saying, I can't
provide for my family, we don't have
enough to eat, and so on.
So we're often asking simple
two-question screeners to
be able to find out, because you
can't tell just by looking.
And that's one of the other things
that I think is important about
this. SNAP and WIC
coverage usage is
highest in rural counties in
Wisconsin, but it is a
statewide issue that this creates.
What are the most nutritious foods
that could go lacking without
food share?
There's no such thing as one
particular nutritious food or
anything like that, but what you'll
find is that families will often
turn to what is cheapest in an
effort to stretch whatever dollars
they have furthest.
So you'll get more processed foods,
possibly fast food, and
things like that because they are
a lot cheaper because of all
sorts of reasons.
What you will see is that they're
less likely to get foods that will
spoil, so you're not gonna see fresh
fruits and vegetables on the same
level.
Maybe dairy, things like.
Because they're not sure when
they'll be able to afford more.
As a policy matter,
what is your reaction to potential
cuts to SNAP or food share
and definite restrictions placed
on the programs?
What it'll do is it'll make it
harder for families to feed
themselves.
It'll make harder for them to
care for their children, to be able
to go to work as adults not
hungry and things of that nature.
And we're going to see the ripple
effect as a result in other areas.
We end up paying more.
Frankly, SNAP allows us to not
only feed Wisconsin families but
put money back into the economy of
local farmers and producers and
stores.
Dr. Dipesh, enough sorry, thanks
very much.
Thanks for having me.
Well, I might.