13 million children go hungry across US: experts

WASHINGTON: It's difficult to pin down the exact numbers, but most nutrition experts agree that on any one day, about 13 million children go hungry across the United States. For older children, the situation improves during the school year when many receive free or reduced-price lunches.

But when the schools close, like they did in the Washington region and up and down the East Coast recently because of heavy snow, these children - instead of cheering over the free day off - must put up with emptier stomachs than usual, child advocates say.

Even more worrisome to people who help feed such children are the long summer months of school vacation. "The food banks see an increase of families with children during the summer months," Lynn Parker, director of nutrition policy at the Food Research and Action Centre in Washington said in an interview.

A massive private effort by humanitarian and religious organizations across the country feeds about 23 million people a year, including 9 million children, many from an ever growing category of people in the United States called the working poor. Second Harvest, which coordinates the programmes, says that's a 9 per cent increase since 1997.

Other groups, like the US Conference of Mayors, report a 17 per cent increase in just one year in requests for emergency food assistance. Whatever the figures, the federal government takes up much of the slack by supporting free and reduced price school breakfasts and lunches at schools. And critics say it's just not enough.

President George W. Bush's proposed budget for 2005 raises the amount slightly to 12 billion dollars for 29 million children in the school programmes. But child advocates, while admitting the budget cuts do not undercut current food programmes, say the figure fails to provide better nutrition in the form of fruits and vegetables instead of traditional high starch diets consumed by the less affluent.

"Cafeterias would be able to buy fresh vegetables and fruits instead of having to serve cheap but empty-calorie food like macaroni and cheese," said Erik Peterson, spokesman for the American School Food Service Association.

Other child advocates say Bush's proposed 12 billion dollars will not accommodate the rising need stemming from unemployment and economic recession in the past years, or to cover the rising food need for children during the summer months.

"There hasn't been such a demand since 1998 because families are struggling to find jobs and the recession hasn't been taken into account," said Deborah Ortiz, director of family income at the Children's Defence Fund. "We are very disappointed with the President's budget plan."

"He's talking about a funding increase for going to the moon (and Mars)," she added. A stronger federal budget for food for children would help diversify their diets and provide more vegetables and fruit and other healthy foods, Ortiz said.

But political conservatives disagree. They say that the nutritional programmes are not necessary. "Child hunger is not nearly as bad as the Washington food advocacy groups make it out to be," said Kirk Johnson, welfare research analyst at the conservative Heritage Foundation in Washington. "Anyone who says there are more than 1 million children hungry in the US, their numbers are not accurate."

He points to the fact that instead of going hungry, about 15.3 per cent of US children are considered obese. "Statistics show that poor people are even more likely to be overweight," he said.

His statements reflect a popular attitude that poor people on the welfare dole, including the many adults who receive food stamps, abuse the system and perhaps even overeat because of it.

However, food advocate groups say recent research shows that often, hunger is the cause of obesity. "If people are hungry, they will eat high fat food to fill them up," said J. Larry Brown, director of the Center on Hunger and Poverty. Especially in the United States, fatty fast foods like hamburgers and French Fries are cheaper and more accessible than fresh fruit and vegetables.

That is a fact that the Heritage Foundation's Johnson found hard to believe. "It's a preference issue, not a money problem. You can get the salad. The question is, would you rather have the salad or the hamburger? I would rather have the hamburger," he said.

Another fact cited by critics of public nutrition programmes as proof of the affluence of food aid recipients is the more than 75 per cent of American households defined as "poor" by the US Census Bureau that own a car.

But to Brown, director of the Centre on Hunger and Poverty, driving in one's own car to the food bank to pick up dinner for the kids is not a contradictory image.

"Hungry people in the United States don't look like hungry people in Africa," said Brown. As members of the growing "working poor", they often own cars and hold jobs - but don't earn enough to buy food after paying rent and other expenses.

Carolyn Genia is one such person. In her hometown of Logan, Ohio, she earns 6.5 dollars an hour, more than 2 dollars above minimum wage. But the mother of two says there are days she struggles to feed her children.

"There are times my children would go hungry if it wasn't for the local food pantry," she wrote in one of the many "Hunger Stories" Americans regularly post on the website of the hunger relief organization Second Harvest.

Brown said the country would need to spend about 90 billion dollars a year to end hunger in the US. "That's not going to happen in the current political limate," he said.

Feb 25, 2004 - LESLIE GARCIA / The Dallas Morning News Kids get twice as many calories when they eat out Study finds their plates are plenty full

[Full text] Next time you plan to go out to dinner with your children, consider this: The average kid eats twice as many calories at a restaurant as he or she does at home.

And according to a study released Tuesday by the Center for Science in the Public Interest, those calories usually aren't healthful ones. What could parents expect from the typical kids' menu of french fries, pizza, fried chicken nuggets and grilled cheese sandwiches?

But the study puts it in artery-choking black and white: Applebee's grilled cheese with fries and a 12-ounce Coke adds up to 1,020 calories and 21 grams of bad fat, according to the group. That's almost as much as an average child needs in a day - plus 4 extra fat grams.

The Spotted Dog Sundae from Outback Steakhouse totaled 730 calories, 31 grams of fat - almost twice as many calories as a child needs in a day.

"Family sit-down restaurants are worse offenders than fast-food places," says Kelly D. Brownell, author of Food Fight (McGraw-Hill; $24.95) and director of the Yale Center for Eating and Weight Disorders. "What you find in most children's meals are the presence of several bad features and absence of good ones."

Many restaurants, including Chili's and others owned by Dallas-based Brinker International, have added or will add more healthful kids' choices.

That's good news for Nancy Pacilio of Arlington, who struggles to find healthful food when she takes her two daughters out to eat.

"Restaurants think the kids want nothing but chicken McNuggets," says the stay-at-home mom, who is a registered dietitian. "We do go out, but the options are pretty bad, I will admit, as far as getting healthy food for kids."

'Obesity epidemic'

The study's author, a watchdog group known for exposing the health failings of such American favorites as Chinese food and movie popcorn, surveyed kids' menus in 20 chain restaurants. Eighty-five percent featured fried chicken fingers or nuggets, a hamburger or cheeseburger. Only one did not include french fries on its kids' menu; instead, it offered hash browns.

"Let's keep in mind the obesity epidemic in this country," says Jayne Hurley, the center's senior nutritionist who conducted the study. "Calories count when you're eating out."

One in five U.S. children is considered overweight. That's 10 million kids - double the number two decades ago. And the National Restaurant Association estimates that Americans eat out four times a week on average.

For the survey, the group sent dishes from seven of the 20 restaurant chains to an independent laboratory for nutritional analysis. It based the findings on "low-active children" 4 to 8 years old, who, according to the Department of Agriculture, should take in 1,500 calories and are allowed 17 grams of harmful fat (saturated-plus-trans fat).

Using those figures as guidelines, Denny's Cheeseburgerlicious with fries equals 760 calories (more than half a day's worth) and all but two of the harmful fat grams. That doesn't include drinks or dessert.

The nutritional analyses didn't surprise Debby Kriz, a clinical dietitian at Children's Medical Center of Dallas who works with diabetic children.

"So often, we assume they won't eat anything else," Ms. Kriz said. "They won't try it, because everything we put in front of them are chicken strips and fries."

Mrs. Pacilio, the Arlington mom, offers her daughters healthful food from her plate. More often than not, she said, they decide they want it, too. And next time they're at the restaurant, the girls order it.

"Most kids are so picky and parents are lazy, unfortunately, and they give in," Mrs. Pacilio said. "If you make it kind of fun, though, 'This is good!' they like it."

More options coming

A growing number of restaurants offer kids healthier choices. Red Lobster, for instance, started its healthier kids' menu Dec. 8, too late for the Center for Science in the Public Interest analysis.

Offerings include steamed snow-crab legs with steamed vegetables, which spokeswoman Wendy Spirduso said is very popular.

Chili's is updating its children's menu, said Chris Barnes, spokesman for Brinker International. It recently added grilled chicken; come spring, side dishes will include black beans, steamed broccoli, cinnamon apples and rice. Currently, consumers who want side orders other than fries need only ask, he said.

On the Border, also owned by Brinker, recently rolled out a kids' menu that includes grilled chicken and Mexican rice, he said.

"We're certainly taking a much more extensive look at nutrition," Mr. Barnes said, citing the formation last month of a nutrition advisory council for the Brinker restaurants.

Denny's is putting "finishing touches" on a kids' menu due out in several months, said public relations director Debbie Atkins. Along with healthier side dishes such as fruit, vegetables and a garden salad, it will include a build-your-own sandwich offering.

"CSPI focused a lot on fries," Ms. Atkins said. "We have applesauce, tomato slices, garden salad, cottage cheese or vegetable of the day that could be substituted."

Ask for alternatives

Most restaurants will substitute more healthful items for fries if the customer asks. Ms. Hurley of the public interest group said the menu should say so.

"Let's feature that, feature an entrée with a vegetable on the menu to remind people and encourage them to get lower-calorie options," she said.

In a prepared statement, Outback Steakhouse Inc., said that the restaurants are "always willing to accommodate customer requests. ... All kids' menu entrees come with a beverage of choice and one side item (except the macaroni and cheese). Our side items include steamed veggies, steamed broccoli, sweet potato ... in our new menu printing (in stores in May), we will also list the side items next to the kids' menu entrees. Currently they are only listed in the main portion of the menu."

Applebee's statement said that the restaurant "will happily make any substitution requested on a kid's meal ... we also are evaluating new healthy and kid-pleasing items for our children's menus."

Consumers need to resist the urge to label restaurants as the bad guys contributing to childhood obesity and poor eating habits, cautioned Kristin Schuetz of the Texas Restaurant Association.

"People tend to blame one entity when it's a big issue," she said. "There are lots of ways to go about solving it."

One way, Dr. Brownell of Yale University said, is to require restaurants to provide customers with nutritional information. On Tuesday, Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, said that he was introducing the Menu Education and Labeling Act (MEAL) in the U.S. Senate, to do just that.

E-mail lgarcia@dallasnews.com

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