|
|
|
|
|
Population Characteristics
|
Food Security
|
Food security is defined as having access
at all times to enough nutritionally adequate and safe foods
to lead a healthy, active lifestyle. Food security and hunger
are measured in the National Health and Nutrition Examination
Survey (NHANES) through a series of questions including
whether the respondent worried that food would run out before
there would be money to buy more; whether the respondent
or his/her family could not afford to eat balanced meals;
whether the respondent or his/her family cut the size of
meals or skipped meals because there was not enough money
for food; and whether the respondent or his/her family ever
went for a whole day without eating because there was not
enough food. For many of these questions, respondents were
asked how often these situations arose. Cases with occasional
or episodic food insecurity and/or hunger were more frequently
reported than those with chronic situations; however, any
degree of food insecurity places the members of a household
at greater nutritional risk due to insufficient access to
nutritionally adequate and safe foods.
In 2003–04, over 17 percent of women were
not fully food secure, and this varied noticeably by race
and ethnicity. Among women, non-Hispanic Whites were most
likely to be fully food secure (88.4 percent), while Hispanics
were least likely (60.5 percent). Hispanic women also had
the highest rate of food insecurity without hunger (18.9
percent). Non-Hispanic Black and Hispanic women had similarly
high rates of being marginally food secure (11.8 and 11.3
percent) and food insecure with hunger (10.4 and 9.4 percent,
respectively).
While nearly 83 percent of women are fully
food secure, only 61.5 percent of women with family incomes
below the Federal poverty level (FPL) and 71.0 percent of
women with incomes of 100–199 percent of the FPL were fully
food secure in 2003–04. Comparatively, nearly 99 percent
of women with family incomes of 400 percent or more of the
FPL were fully food secure (data not shown).
> Vertical
Bar Chart: Food Security Among Women 18 Years and
Older, by Race/Ethnicity, 2003-04
|
|
|
|
|
Back to top |
|
|
Women's Health USA 2007 is not copyrighted. Readers are free to duplicate and use all or part of the information contained on this page. Suggested Citation: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Health Resources and Services Administration,
Women's Health USA 2007. Rockville, Maryland: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, 2007. |