Food Insecurity in Seniors

Throughout the nation, an emerging issue is food insecurity in older adults. More than 2.9 million food-insecure households included an adult 65 or older in 2018. Roughly 1.3 million seniors were food insecure and 510,000 were very low food insecure. Food insecurity can have a negative impact on the health of older adults. Conditions such as diabetes, depression, hypertension, asthma and many other health outcomes are associated with food insecurity in senior adults. In addition, food insecure adults have more frequent hospitalizations and visits to physician’s offices and emergency rooms than Nearly 1 in 12 their food secure counterparts. seniors are Kern County had a threatened by senior poverty rate of 14%, or 20,397 hunger . residents living in poverty in 2019. Those who do not live in poverty are often on fixed incomes and—with rising housing, healthcare, utilities, and other basic living costs—are often forced to sacrifice meals in order to make ends meet. CAPK Food Bank’s Senior Food Program meets the needs of our senior population by distributing approximately 150,500 pounds of nutrient-rich food every month. Through the Food2Door program that number has been increased to more than 400,000 pounds every month. More than 8,000 seniors benefit from these programs monthly. CAPK doesn’t have room to run this critical program out of the existing Food Bank. It spends an additional $4,449.00 a month to lease a 6,000 sq. ft. building—located one-half mile away from the main warehouse—to receive, store, and assemble more than 8,000 senior food boxes each month. The separate warehouse arrangement is not efficient operationally and takes valuable resources—money, time, volunteers—to travel back and forth between locations. We’ve incorporated this massive amount of food box creation into our current plans for expansion.

Rudy Plaza, Food2Door Recipient Rudy and his wife are recipients of the Food2Door program. This program is important to families like theirs because they fall into the age bracket where they are most vulnerable to serious illness due to COVID-19. Rudy’s wife also has IV cancer, making her even more susceptible to the serious effects from the disease. “My wife and I have been married for forty years and we’ve come to a point now in our senior years where we could use a little help. Like most seniors, we aren’t able to get out and shop as often as we used to because of COVID, so this is a great help to us right now. With my wife being sick, we isolate ourselves to keep our family safe. These food boxes help bring good nutrition to us, which happens to be really important for my wife right now, being that she’s sick. This program means a lot to people like us; it’s more than just food. You’re reaching out to people like us—who’ve been isolated for some time—and really making a difference.”