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Developed by the Center on Hunger and Poverty and Food Research and Action Center
Executive Summary
Both obesity and hunger (and, more broadly, food insecurity) are serious public health problems, sometimes co-existing in the same families and the same individuals. Food insecurity exists when people, due to economic constraints, lack access to enough food to fully meet basic needs at all times. They fear running out of food, and reduce the quality of their diets and/or reduce the quantity of food they consume. Food insecurity is not limited to those for whom energy supplies are always inadequate, which helps explain why those who are food insecure can also be overweight.
A lack of adequate resources for food could result in weight gain in several ways:
The need to maximize caloric intake. Low-income families stretch their food money as far as possible. Low-income families may consume lower-cost foods with relatively higher levels of calories per dollar to stave off hunger when they lack the money to purchase a healthier balance of more nutritious foods. The greater the economic constraints, the harder it will be for families to achieve the nutritional quality of foods they desire. This in turn affects the overall energy density of the diet.
The trade-off between food quantity and quality. Research shows that, along the continuum of typical coping strategies, food quality is generally affected before the quantity of intake. Households reduce food spending by changing the quality or variety of food consumed before they reduce the quantity of food eaten. As a result, while families may get enough food to avoid feeling hungry, they also may be poorly nourished because they cannot afford a consistently adequate diet that promotes health and averts obesity. In the short term, the stomach registers that it is full, not whether a meal was nutritious.
Overeating when food is available. Research indicates that chronic ups and downs in food availability can cause people to eat more, when food is available, than they normally would. Over time, this cycle can result in weight gain. Research among food-insecure families also shows that low-income mothers first sacrifice their own nutrition by restricting their food intake during periods of food insufficiency in order to protect their children from hunger. This phenomenon may result in eating more than is desirable when food is available, thereby contributing to obesity among poor women.
Physiological changes. Physiological changes may occur to help the body conserve energy when diets are periodically inadequate. The body can compensate for periodic food shortages by becoming more efficient at storing more calories as fat.
Both hunger/food insecurity and obesity have costly direct and indirect consequences. By impairing health status and cognitive function, hunger/ food insecurity and obesity not only limit the well-being of individuals, but also undermine the nation?s investments in education and our need for a more productive and competitive workforce.
Greater availability and nutritional quality of vital federal food programs such as food stamps, school lunch and breakfast, WIC and child care food can go a long way toward reducing hunger, food insecurity, and obesity in America. These programs can also support increased physical activity by children and their families. At the same time, our nation can address the more fundamental causes of hunger by focusing on more adequate wages, affordable housing, and health care and child care to reduce poverty and support the efforts of families to be productive and self-sufficient.
Improving the nutritional status of households through these means will do much to ward off hunger and food insecurity, and also combat increasing rates of obesity, thereby improving the health and security of millions of Americans.
Published July 2003
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