Latest News National News Child Nutrition Reauthorization is a Good Long-Term Investment
Child Nutrition Reauthorization is a Good Long-Term Investment
Strengthening child nutrition programs is a long-term investment in our children's health and education. A small investment now will save billions of dollars in related costs of child hunger and obesity.
One in four children is at risk of hunger and one in three is obese or overweight.
The annual cost of our nation's hunger problem is estimated at over $90 billion per year. Food-insecure children are sick more often, recover more slowly, and are more likely to be hospitalized, at an average cost of $12,000 per pediatric stay.
The annual health care cost of obesity in the U.S. has doubled in less than a decade and may be as high as 147 billion dollars a year according to the CDC Foundation. The medical costs for an obese person are 42 percent higher than for a person of normal weight.
Investing in child nutrition programs would go a long way to reducing child hunger and childhood obesity. The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act (S. 3307) would better connect low-income children to healthy meals before, in, and afterschool. The bill would strengthen nutrition standards for school meals and increase the resources available to improve the nutritional quality of school meals.
The House must pass the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act as soon as Congress returns next week. Visit www.hungeractioncenter.org/video.aspx to learn more about child hunger and obesity and to send an email to Congress in support of the child nutrition bill.
