Massachusetts Food is Medicine State Plan | Western Mass Regional Listening Session, Berkshire County

Berkshire County:

Friday, May 4 from 12:00 – 1:30 PM at Berkshire Community College, Room G12, 1350 West St. Pittsfield, MA 01201 (free parking and lunch provided). Residents from any part of Western Mass, including Pioneer Valley, are welcome to attend.

Event Details

Food is essential to health, but too many Massachusetts residents lack access to the healthy food they need to heal and be well. The goal of the Massachusetts Food is Medicine State Plan is to improve the health of Massachusetts residents living with acute or chronic illness by increasing access to crucial food and nutrition services.

To develop the State Plan, we will be holding seven regional listening sessions across the Commonwealth during the spring and summer of 2018.  These listening sessions will seek to more fully understand:

• Barriers to connecting individuals in need to Food is Medicine services, and
• How Food is Medicine interventions are being deployed in the community.

Using data collected from these listening sessions and targeted surveys we will develop and publish a State Plan outlining measurable strategies to better match the availability of Food is Medicine interventions to the needs of Massachusetts communities.

As a key stakeholder interested in the role that food insecurity and other social determinants play in driving health outcomes, we hope that you will join us at one of our Western Massachusetts Regional Listening Sessions to learn about the State Plan Initiative and share your experiences and perspective.