The health consequences of that include obesity and higher risks of everything from heart disease to cancer to diabetes.
Campaigns to encourage healthier eating have ranged from public service announcements to celebrity chefs promoting veggie-loaded recipes to former First Lady Michelle Obama’s White House vegetable garden. But a new phrase has sprouted into the conversation in recent years: prescription produce.
“Eating fruits and vegetables is absolutely essential to a healthy life,” said Gabrielle Langholtz, marketing director of Wholesome Wave, a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing healthy food to low-income people. “But if you only have a few dollars a day to spend on food, you’re not buying broccoli and green beans and blueberries, you’re buying Minute Rice and ramen noodles.”
Wholesome Wave, which is based in Bridgeport, Connecticut, works with doctors and health clinics around the country to change that. With grants and donations, its FVRx program provides “prescriptions” – coupons redeemable at farmers’ markets or grocery stores, but only for fruits and vegetables.
“In the short term families in poverty get to eat better and the farmers make more money,” Langholtz said. “In the longer term there are very real health benefits and healthcare savings.”