Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Household Food Insecurity During the COVID-19 Pandemic: a Nationally Representative Study
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Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Household Food Insecurity During the COVID-19 Pandemic: a Nationally Representative Study Danielle Xiaodan Morales 1
&
Stephanie Alexandra Morales 1 & Tyler Fox Beltran 1
Received: 27 July 2020 / Revised: 28 September 2020 / Accepted: 4 October 2020 # W. Montague Cobb-NMA Health Institute 2020
Abstract Previous research has demonstrated that the burden of household food insecurity is disproportionately high among racial/ethnic minority groups, yet no peer-reviewed studies have systematically examined racial/ethnic disparities in household food insecurity in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. This cross-sectional study on household food insecurity during COVID-19 used data from a nationally representative sample of US households through the 2020 Household Pulse Survey (HPS) (including all 50 states and the District of Columbia, n = 74,413 households). Six generalized estimating equation (GEE) models were estimated, and the results indicated that households headed by Blacks, Asians, Hispanics, or other racial/ethnic minorities were not significantly more food insecure than White households during the pandemic. However, among food-insecure households, Black households were more likely to report that they could not afford to buy more food; Asian and Hispanic households were more likely to be afraid to go out to buy food; Asian households were more likely to face transportation issues when purchasing food; while White households were more likely to report that stores did not have the food they wanted. Moreover, racial/ethnic minorities were significantly less confident about their household food security for the next 4 weeks than Whites. The coronavirus pandemic crisis has exposed and exacerbated the food injustice in American society. Policymakers and local officials should take concerted actions to improve the capacity of food supply and ensure food equality across all racial/ethnic groups. Keywords Food insecurity . Race/ethnicity . Household pulse survey . COVID-19
Introduction Household food insecurity, defined as the limited or uncertain ability to acquire adequate food for one or more household members [1], remains an issue of great concern among American families. According to a recent US Department of Agriculture (USDA) report, in 2018, about 11.1% of US households experienced food insecurity at least part of the time, which equates to 37.2 million people, including 11.2 million children [2]. The salience of food insecurity has been underscored by its links to adverse health and social
outcomes. People from food-insecure households, for example, tend to report poorer physical health [3–5], symptoms of anxiety or depression [6, 7], lower self-esteem [8], and poorer overall mental health status [9, 10]. Particularly, children who live in food-insecure homes are more likely to have emotional distress, decreased quality of life, and worse academic performance [11–14]. Annually, food insecurity has caused at least 160 billion dollars of economic burden in the USA [15]. Therefore
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