Hunger is not an isolated problem; it affects our entire society.
There are economic and societal costs of hunger that we all bear. Hunger costs our nation at least $167.5 billion per year according to a recent report from the Center for American Progress and Brandeis University. What generates this cost? You might be surprised to learn that only a fraction of the expenditure, 11 percent, comes from charities that feed the hungry. Another 11 percent is attributed to poor education outcomes and lost earning potential due to hunger. But the lion's share 78 percent in hunger costs is from avoidable health care expenses associated with lack of access to nutritious foods.
At the Chattanooga Area Food Bank, we see these national statistics reflected in the situations our clients face every day. A recent survey found 45 percent of households we serve have at least one person with diabetes and 71 percent have at least one person with hypertension. Yet, 91 percent of our clients said they purchased cheap, unhealthy food as their main coping strategy to stretch their budgets.
To illustrate, let's circle back to one of our typical client families John, his wife Elaine and their two children. John has diabetes, but earning minimum wage, he cannot afford his employer's health insurance premium, so he declines coverage. Elaine is looking for work, but in their current situation there is not enough money to pay for healthy food, rent and insulin. They choose to pay the rent because their family needs a place to live. To stretch their budget, John and Elaine choose less healthy foods. John's condition worsens from the higher levels of fat, sodium and sugar in these foods, and his medical expenses continue to increase. Because he is uninsured, the costs of his care are eventually borne by others in our society.
We can no longer ignore the growing body of research that shows the relationship between food insecurity and diet related illnesses. The Chattanooga Area Food Bank and others like it around the country have begun to ask: "Is it enough to meet basic caloric needs or can we do more? Can we also improve lives through better nutrition?" When we asked ourselves these questions two years ago, the answer from our board and staff was a resounding "Yes." This led to the expansion of our mission to include the promotion of better nutrition.
A new emphasis on nutrition forced us to modify our operations and to expand our food-sourcing programs. Like most food banks, we have historically relied on donations of non-perishable dry goods and canned food. Over the past decade these donations have decreased as companies have improved their operational efficiencies. Consequently, we knew that if we were going to feed more people healthier food, we would have to find new sources. So we reached out to local growers to buy their excess products for a minimal cost. We formed a partnership with a dairy that offered us milk at a discounted price and agreed to distribute milk directly to agency partners throughout our service area. We made significant investments to facilitate storage of more fresh foods (refrigerated trucks, cold storage). Finally, we sought additional funds to purchase the foods that we do not receive through donation.
We think we've invested wisely and that our investment will yield a favorable return on investment for our clients and the communities we serve. We know these changes won't happen overnight and that we will face obstacles. But we believe it is a better choice to spend our money, as a community, on providing healthy foods rather than on avoidable health care costs. It's a good lesson for all of us, not just food banks: Each one of us must ask ourselves what the society we want to live in should look like and how we can achieve it together. Are we wiling to be proactive and pay for an ounce of prevention, or do we wait until it costs us a pound of cure?
Maeghan Jones is president of the Chattanooga Area Food Bank.