rewrite this title Hunger in the U.S.: The invisible and lasting scars

Hunger in the U.S. doesn’t look like third-world famine. But the physical impacts on health — and the psychological scars — can last a lifetime.

JUANA SUMMERS, HOST:

Millions of Americans are expected to lose federal food benefits in the next few years as states implement new Republican requirements for SNAP. But for many who need these – this food, hunger is not political. It’s visceral, and the health effects can last for years. Karen Brown of New England Public Media reports.

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: How many items here, you say?

UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: Three.

KAREN BROWN, BYLINE: Marilyn Vargas is pushing a grocery cart at a food bank in Easthampton, Massachusetts.

MARILYN VARGAS: So I have a pack of breast chicken. I have cookies, Cheerios.

BROWN: Her household of six needs this food. She says their only income is her disability check. And when the federal government delayed November’s SNAP benefits during the shutdown…

VARGAS: Yes, I was very worried ’cause I don’t get enough money.

BROWN: Fresh in her mind is the time before she moved to this area, when she couldn’t afford any food because transportation to her job fell through.

VARGAS: And I felt terrible. I was crying. I was desperate. The only food I had, I gave it to my kids.

BROWN: This is what hunger looks like in the U.S., says Mariana Chilton, a UMass Amherst public health professor. It’s not the stereotype that many people imagine.

MARIANA CHILTON: They think, oh, there couldn’t possibly be hunger in America ’cause the way that we know that that exists is because children have distended bellies and flies in their eyes or look visibly malnourished.

BROWN: In reality, Chilton says, hunger can show up in many ways, like schoolkids’ behavior.

CHILTON: They can’t focus. They may be more likely to get in fights with their peers or not be able to listen.

BROWN: In babies, she says, even short-term hunger can affect the brain. They’re growing hundreds of neurons a second and need fuel to interact with the world.

CHILTON: Even just one or two days of reduced intake is going to affect their cognitive, social and emotional development.

BROWN: Mary Cowhey is a retired teacher in western Massachusetts. She can attest to the lasting scars of hunger. Cowhey grew up on Long Island in a family of 10, with only her father’s salary as a teacher. She says they survived largely on potatoes and surplus shark given to them by a local fisherman.

MARY COWHEY: We were glad to have the shark and potatoes because there were some times when we didn’t have the shark and potatoes.

BROWN: She remembers the pain of an empty belly, jealousy over classmates’ lunches and competing for food at the table.

COWHEY: It was not uncommon for my sister to, like, reach over and take something off my plate, so we learned to eat really fast.

BROWN: Only the youngest siblings got milk, and Cowhey remembers getting her first school physical in fourth grade.

COWHEY: And I remember the nurse letting me read the scale, you know, when you’d push the thing across, and it was 40 pounds.

BROWN: She was 9. Cowhey is now 65. After a series of broken bones, she was diagnosed with severe osteoporosis. She blames an early lack of calcium. Her bones are so brittle, her doctor says another fall could disable her. And even though she hasn’t gone without food in decades, Cowhey still describes herself as an opportunistic eater. When she sees food, she eats it.

COWHEY: There’s this mentality of, like, in case there’s not food tomorrow. For me, that never went away.

BROWN: Conservative politicians often claim fraud in the SNAP program as a reason to limit benefits. Marilyn Vargas, leaving the food bank with a full cart, has another theory.

VARGAS: I don’t think they’ve ever been hungry, exactly, especially Trump. He’s never been hungry ’cause his father was rich.

BROWN: In 2023, 13% of American households were considered food-insecure by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. There is no public data after that because the Trump administration has canceled the annual survey. For NPR News, I’m Karen Brown in Western Massachusetts.

SUMMERS: This story comes from NPR’s partnership with New England Public Media and KFF Health News.

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