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Why Paying for Nutrition Saves Money on Health Care | Time.com
04.10.2017The foods we eat play a central role in our health. The epidemics of our time—obesity, heart disease, type 2 diabetes—are intimately tied to unhealthy patterns of eating. But eating healthy is also expensive, making it particularly challenging for households who have to worry whether they can afford enough food each month.
The common coping strategy is to purchase cheaper, less healthy foods in an effort to make their food budgets last longer. Over time, however, these unhealthy dietary patterns can have a significant impact on a person’s health. Children living in food-insecure homes suffer two to four times as many health problems and are less likely to reach their academic potential. Pregnant women who are food insecure are more likely to develop gestational diabetes and deliver pre-term or low birth-weight babies. Food-insecure adults are more likely to have diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, kidney disease and osteoporosis.
The trouble doesn’t stop there. Once you have one of these illnesses, food insecurity often makes that illness harder to manage. It is not surprising, then, that food insecurity comes with a cost.
Source: Why Paying for Nutrition Saves Money on Health Care | Time.com
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