Food Politics

COVID-19 doesn’t affect everyone equally. The main risk factors discussed by scientists have been age and pre-existing chronic disease. But the coronavirus has been especially lethal to people of color in the United States. What are the causes of this inequality, and are there things we can do about it?

Recent events have been heartbreaking, and they have exposed more widely, how pervasive and painful racism is in our world. Our hearts go out to everyone who’s hurting, to everyone who’s frightened, and particularly to the communities of color that are bearing the terrible brunt of systemic racism, as they have been for centuries.

Categorized as essential workers, farmworkers continue to help provide the nation with food. But their lack of basic protections puts them uniquely at risk for exposure to COVID-19, threatening their livelihoods, their families, and those of us that rely on them to get food from fields to plates.

Although the U.S. food system is plagued with problems, heroic people have devoted themselves to improving the quality and accessibility of good, healthy food. Among these changemakers are a group of African American female entrepreneurs whose initiatives are inspiring examples of hope in action.

Evidence of the link between urinary tract infections and foodborne pathogens has mounted for decades, but you wouldn’t know it from federal policy.

Industrial animal agriculture is a total environmental disaster, polluting local ecosystems and contributing to climate change. While one obvious response is simply to stop eating animals, there’s a growing movement known as “regenerative agriculture” that claims that raising cows can be part of the solution to climate change and other environmental problems. We asked Dr Doug Gurian-Sherman, a leading agricultural scientist, to share the real science with our readers.

The Annals of Internal Medicine has published what many are calling the “red meat papers”, advising Americans that there’s no need to cut down on consumption of red and processed meats. But in reality, the red-meat papers are not a breakthrough study. In fact, they didn’t study anything at all. They merely re-examined the data using a tool that was designed for measuring the efficacy of pharmaceutical drugs, not lifestyle interventions. Then they declared that decades of research, regulations by international bodies, and common sense were wrong. If you want the facts, here’s what you need to know.

School lunches don’t exactly have the best reputation. But for millions of kids, they are a critical source of nutrition and sometimes the only truly reliable meal of the day. And while there are some subsidy programs in place, many poor families are winding up in ever-deepening cycles of school lunch debt. Why is this happening? And what can we do about it?

Many foods sold in the United States are banned or fiercely regulated in other countries due to harmful additives, growth promoters, genetically engineered ingredients, herbicides, or other dangerous practices. Does this concern you? It should!

Since 2009, enrollees in the USDA’s Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) have been allowed to purchase fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. Has the program worked? According to a new study, it has! And the results shed light on how we can uplift the health of children and reverse the onslaught of childhood obesity.

Despite all that we’ve learned about the power of food from tens of thousands of medical studies, rates of chronic disease continue to rise. And the medical establishment continues to apply brilliant science to the treatment of disease — while practically ignoring the central role of nutrition in promoting illness — or preventing it. But the times, they are a-changin'! Find out how medicine is evolving — fast — and what you can do to accelerate the transformation.

Struggling to have (or provide) a healthy school lunch? Provided school lunches are still a work in progress. But you can take matters into your own hands with these homemade, healthy lunch recipes for school (or work).