Coronavirus Reverses Decades Of Progress In Easing Hunger In Kids – Patch.com

ACROSS AMERICA Kids are losing a lot of their innocence to the coronavirus pandemic. For millions of them, the pain of the pandemic is hitting the pit of their stomachs.

No Kid Hungry predicts that anywhere from 9 million to 17 million children could struggle to get enough to eat by the end of the year because of the pandemic.

No Kid Hungry is a national campaign run by the Share Our Strength nonprofit that works to solve problems of hunger and poverty both domestically and globally. No Kid Hungry works closely with Feeding America, the nation's largest nonprofit hunger-relief organization, which last month offered a startling picture of hunger in America amid a pandemic.

No Kid Hungry estimates that nearly half 47 percent of American families are now living with hunger, according to a national survey and study by No Kid Hungry. It's even worse among Hispanic and Black families, where food insecurity rates are 56 percent and 53 percent, respectively.

In the decade before the pandemic, hunger relief organizations made meaningful headway in cutting food insecurity among children a problem that nonetheless affected one in six U.S. children in 2017 and one in seven two years later, according to Feeding America, the nation's largest nonprofit hunger-relief organization and a No Kid Hungry partner.

Heading into 2020, food insecurity among children was at the lowest rate on record since the U.S. Department of Agriculture began tracking the key measure of childhood well-being in 1998.

Then came crushing job losses and other crises that threw millions of Americans into a vortex of economic uncertainty that no one is sure how long will last.

"It was one in seven," said Adrienne Carter, a spokeswoman for No Kid Hungry. "That's an incredible increase."

No Kid Hungry and other hunger relief programs and organizations have "made a ton of progress" in closing meal gaps for kids with in-school programs that bring breakfast into the classroom and others, Carter said.

"The pandemic has thrown things off and set us back," she said. "It's frustrating to see 10 years of progress being wiped out."

In "The Longest Summer," No Kid Hungry's special report on the effects of the pandemic, the organization found:

"The consequences of this will be felt for years to come," Carter said.

Research shows links between food insecurity and a range of health problems, behavioral issues and mental health conditions that can affect academic performance, the likelihood of graduating from high school and their earning capacity as adults.

Carter also noted that though most parents try to shield them, many kids whose families are struggling are experiencing the pandemic differently than kids from more-affluent families. Parents answering a survey reported that they try to protect their children's innocence so they won't have to worry about whether there will be food on the table.

There's no single profile for America's hungry kids. Some are homeless, but most aren't. Their parents may be among the four in 10 Americans living paycheck to paycheck. Those families were among the most affected as the economy shed 22.2 million jobs when businesses were shuttered under pandemic stay-at-home orders.

These families are facing other crises as well, including a looming eviction crisis that could mean 40 million Americans will lose their homes by year's end. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention used its broad powers to halt renter evictions through the end of the year to help control the spread of the coronavirus.

However, the action delays rather than prevents the evictions and "extends the financial cliff for renters to fall off when the moratorium expires and back rent is owed," Diane Yentel, who heads the National Low Income Housing Coalition, told The Associated Press.

"We're talking about really hungry kids the ones who look forward to getting that backpack of food to take home for the weekend," Gay Anderson, the president of the School Nutrition Association, told Patch in an interview last year for a story about childhood hunger.

"I've heard many times, 'Oh my gosh, look what we get,' and seen the excitement in knowing they're going to have some food to eat," Anderson, the child nutrition director for Brandon Valley Schools in South Dakota, said of children's reactions to the backpacks filled with groceries they take home to their families Friday afternoons.

Stopgap measures like those disappeared when schools closed last spring.

Schools are reopening under a smorgasbord of plans that have taken shape amid contentious political debate. A strong point in favor of in-person learning is that the physical classroom is a lifeline for kids whose meals grow skimpier toward the end of the month when their families' food assistance benefits run out, or whose parents may skip meals so they can eat.

Supporting local food banks and community partnerships that provide free food and support school programs are steps people can take in their local communities to provide immediate help, but the "scope and magnitude of this challenge" requires a significant federal response, No Kid Hungry's Carter said.

Calling child hunger "an imminently solvable problem," she said the most effective ways to feed children during the pandemic require congressional action.

Among specific recommendations are for Congress to support and strengthen programs such as SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, and P-EBT, the Pandemic Electronic Benefit Transfer program. The P-EBT program authorizes states to issue food assistance benefits to parents whose children temporarily lost access to free and reduced-price school meals because of the pandemic-related changes.

The USDA extended the more-flexible rules for free and reduced-price meals until year's end, stretching out a program that served nearly 30 million children before schools shuttered in the spring.

Families now can pick up free food from any school campus, regardless of whether their kids are enrolled there or if they qualify for free and reduced meals. Before Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue extended the program for another four months, families faced having to start paying for the food and picking it up only from the schools their children attended.

"The waivers for school lunch are a big win for kids," No Kid Hungry's Carter said, adding that the extension is "just a stopgap until December that needs to go through the entire year."

Patch has partnered with Feeding America to help raise awareness on behalf of the millions of Americans facing hunger. Feeding America, which supports 200 food banks across the country, estimates that in 2020, more than 54 million Americans will not have enough nutritious food to eat due to the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. This is a Patch social good project; Feeding America receives 100 percent of donations. Find out how you can donate in your community or find a food pantry near you.

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Coronavirus Reverses Decades Of Progress In Easing Hunger In Kids - Patch.com