“For a nation that produces more food per person than any other in the world, the United States has a major problem with hunger — and it only grew worse during the recent recession and its aftermath. Close to 50 million people in the U.S. are living with food insecurity, meaning they don’t always have adequate nutrition for an active and healthy life. Children have been hit particularly hard, with about a quarter living in families that don’t always know when or if they will eat their next meal. To illustrate the scope of this growing American inequality, PBS NewsHour traveled to Orange County, Calif. — a community famous for showcasing its wealth in television shows like “The OC” and “The Real Housewives.” In the neighborhoods surrounding Disneyland, we explored a stunning contradiction: Orange County is among the top 10 places in the U.S. for childhood hunger. That’s according to the anti-hunger group Feeding America. Nearly 400,000 people in the county — and 1 in 5 children — classify as “food insecure.” Michele Cummings, a local mother, helped us to examine the long-term consequences of that reality. Cummings lives in the Tina Pacific neighborhood of Anaheim. Just 17 miles from Newport Beach, where average home prices top $2 million, Anaheim’s subdivisions are filled with low-wage workers who prop up the county’s luxury economy but often struggle to support their own families. When it comes to feeding her daughter, Cummings, like most of her neighbors, once compensated with an over-reliance on cheap, processed foods that were often barren of real nutrients. Even as she was buying those foods, Cummings worried about the implications. And for good reason. Recent research suggests that a number of factors converge for low-income families to create a paradoxical set of health issues, leading to both malnutrition and obesity, as well as a slate of other chronic diseases. Barbara Laraia of the University of California, Berkeley, helped us break down some of that research in the segment. NewsHour rarely highlights a dire problem without also looking at potential solutions. For that piece of the story, we met up with OC Health Officer Dr. Eric Handler, who had recently begun calling for local leaders to treat childhood hunger like a public health crisis. As Handler describes, he kicked off the movement by asking the head of a local food bank, “‘If we were able to capture food that is wasted and direct it to people in need, could we end hunger in Orange County?’ And he said yes.” So Handler launched the “Waste Not OC” initiative, a multi-sector effort in which excess food from restaurants, resorts, sporting venues and schools is re-directed to food banks for distribution. “Waste Not OC” is representative of the grassroots efforts that are popping up in communities throughout the country, including community gardens, corner store conversions and new grocery stores in food deserts. But in most places, these initiatives are also relatively small-scale, and it’s highly questionable whether they will be the silver bullet that so many hope they will. For that reason, we also interviewed Dr. Phyllis Agran, one of the county’s leading pediatricians, who has also been vocal in her belief that wider-spread change will only come if local, state and federal governments put their minds to the task and change policies. We believe the final piece illustrates the complexity of the issue while still showing that change is possible.”
