Food is Medicine: Addressing Hunger as a Health Issue

On January 17, 2018, CHLPI’s Faculty Director, Robert Greenwald, spoke at the Food is Medicine: Addressing Hunger as a Health Issue panel discussion. The briefing kicked off the launch of a new bipartisan Food is Medicine Working Group within the House Hunger Caucus.

For over a decade, the bipartisan Hunger Caucus has served as a forum for Members and staff to discuss, advance, and engage the House’s work on national and international hunger and food insecurity issues. This year the Caucus builds upon its foundation
to bring into focus the impacts of hunger on our nation’s health. 

The event’s panel included:

• Dariush Mozaffarian, MD, DrPH
  Dean, Tufts Friedman School of Nutrition Science & Policy; Jean Mayer Professor of Nutrition and Medicine
•  Robert Greenwald, JD
  Faculty Director, Center for Health Law and Policy Innovation; Harvard Law School, Clinical Professor of Law
• Kathleen Merrigan, PhD
  Director, GW Food Institute; The George Washington University, Professor of Public Policy
• Karen Siebert
  Advocacy and Public Policy Advisor, Harvesters – The Community Food Network on behalf of the Feeding America network

Congress members Jim McGovern, Lynn Jenkins, Chellie Pingree, and Dr. Roger Marshall were all on hand to lend their thoughts on the importance of the Food is Medicine movement.

Quotes from  Food is Medicine: Addressing Hunger as a Health Issue:

• Congressman Jim McGovern – “My hope is that this working group is going to be about more than just talk, it’s going to be about action.”
• Congresswoman Chellie Pingree – “Every conversation we have connects health outcomes to what we eat. I think it seems only logical that we should be talking about this as a policy issue. Whether it’s medically tailored meals or prescriptions for fruits and vegetables, there are a lot of good ideas out there.”
• Robert Greenwald – “We need to start to integrate Food is Medicine into more mainstream Medicare and Medicaid programs particularly given the growing body of research that demonstrates how cost saving and not just cost-effective medically tailored meals are.”

View a recording of the congressional briefing on Facebook.

View CHLPI’s slides from the congressional briefing.