Health Disparities, Food Marketing/Food Deserts and Food Systems

Getting started…what do we know about health disparities and systemic food injustice? (Note: A wide and complex topic such as this is difficult to address in one place and not every community is represented here). Read on..

Health disparities/health equity…

• What are health disparities? provides a definition and examples.
• Health disparities – infographics for various diseases/conditions.
• Social determinants of health including education, housing and income – infographics.
• American Association of Pediatrics policy statement: The impact of racism on child and adolescent health recognizes that racism is a social determinants of health and shares how it affects the health of youth.
• How do social, racial and economic disparities impact diet and health? – a timely, candid, expert-led conversation about social justice and disparities related to dietary intake patterns and health outcomes. (Recording from July 8, 2020 Diet ID webinar).
• Advancing health equity provides some key principles and steps to consider.
• Islamophobia, health and public health: a systematic literature review looks at Islamophobia and health equity (9 page PDF).

Latinos/Hispanics

• Identifying and addressing Latino health disparities and looks at country of origin as well as those born in the U.S. as compared to those not born in the U.S.
• Profile shows the top states where Hispanics/Latinos live as well as health statistics.

Food marketing/food deserts

• Ads for brands like McD’s and Sprite often target people of color.
• Food deserts more abundant in minority neighborhoods.
• Unshared Bounty: How Structural Racism Contributes to the Creation and Persistence of Food Deserts (53 pp, 2012).
• Neighborhood Disparities in Access to Healthy Foods and Their Effects on Environmental Justice (2012).
• Food Access Research Atlas (USDA, ERS) replaces Food Desert Locator) provides food access indicators, data and Census track data.

Food systems

• Journal of Agriculture, Food System and Community Development – Summer 2015 full issue (PDF, 212 pp) – Race and ethnicity in food systems work.
• Dismantling racism in the food system (7 pp, PDF).

Resources

• Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics – Member Interest Groups and Dietetic Practice Groups
• Free recorded webinar (Dec. 2019): Nourishing Cultural Connections: Enrichment from Similarities and Differences from the Nutrition Education for the Public Dietetic Practice Group, Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. This webinar presents the heritage, legacy, and culturally-specific dietary practices that influence health outcomes of the major ethnic and cultural subpopulations in the US today, and the value of such insights for effectiveness in nutrition and dietetics practice. Speaker: Lauren Swann, MS, RD, LDN.
• Implicit Association Test (IAT) that measures attitudes and beliefs people may be unwilling or unable to see. (There’s a blog here as well.)
• Food Justice Now is one book available for free reading online through August 31, 2020 from the University of Minnesota Press’ Open Access Titles. There are more.