Today is the sixth annual Hunger Awareness Day, sponsored by America's Second Harvest. All too often we think of hunger as something affecting other countries (which of course it does) and focus more on obesity than hunger in America, but we have a serious problem with it here in the United States as well. Some of the numbers:
⢠The A2H (America's Second Harvest) system served an estimated 24 to 27 million unduplicated people annually, with a midpoint of 25.3 million. This includes 22 to 25 million pantry users, 1.2 to 1.4 million kitchen users, and 0.8 million shelter users.
⢠Approximately 4.5 million different people receive emergency food assistance from the A2H system in any given week.
⢠36.4% of the members of households served by the A2H National Network are children under 18 years old.
⢠8% of the members of households are children age 0 to 5 years.
⢠10% of the members of households are elderly.
Via A2H, you can find out if any events are happening in your area, or check out other ways to help. Donations of time and money in addition to food are, of course, always welcome. They note:
The America's Second Harvest Network believes that every single person can do something to help end hunger in America.
Whether you have one dollar to give or one hour to share, you can make an enormous difference in the lives of the hungry people all across America.
- Log in to post comments
There are many factors behind hunger in America. Most of the time the lack of food has nothing to do with it.
More often it's the lack of money, the lack of food preparation and storage facilities. The lack of training in food preparation and preservation comes into play in many cases. Then you have those who cannot prepare their own food for medical or age related reasons. And those with an addiction or like need that means they end up without the money they need to get food. The Federal government's programs to promote the production of certain foodstuffs goes a long way to making certain foods cheaper than they'd otherwise be, and other foods costlier. The cost of other foods is kept artificially high thanks to tariffs keeping cheaper imports out of the market.
Then you have the fact that some people are simply not that functional. No initiative. They don't want to do things for themselves, they want others to do it for them. It's entitlement as a pathology, and our social assistance system, public and private, encourages this. because if we got serious about teaching people how to be self-sufficient a lot of people would no longer be able to patronize and dominate others.
Truly helping the hungry means making your assistance unnecessary. But some folks don't want to lose the thrill they get from degrading their fellow man under the guise of helping him.
"End Hunger Save Countless Lives"