As the fiscal 2024 budget battle unfolded, congressional Republicans made their position clear — they wanted spending on anti-poverty efforts to be dramatically slashed. Among the cutback targets were two longstanding nutrition programs: the nearly 50-year-old Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, known as WIC, and the 60-year-old Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), previously called food stamps. Critics of the plan, which would have cut WIC and restricted what SNAP recipients can purchase, vociferously argued that cutbacks would result in an immediate increase in hunger among children and families.
Their pushback was successful and, at least for now, the cuts have been averted. Thanks to organizing by grocers, anti-hunger groups and food companies, WIC was funded at $7 billion for the remainder of fiscal 2024. Similarly, restrictions on SNAP coverage were derailed. Nonetheless, when debates over fiscal 2025 expenditures get underway this summer, public benefits advocates expect Republicans to once again issue a call for slashes to the programs.
For their part, progressives and nutrition advocates are equally determined to protect SNAP and WIC, programs deemed lifelines with well-documented health benefits. WIC, in particular, has long been considered the gold standard, providing pregnancy support, postpartum care, and wellness checks and immunizations for children from birth until age 5.
According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) “WIC is one of the nation’s most successful and cost-effective nutrition intervention programs.” Nonetheless, the crux of the program is support for healthy eating.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) stress the efficacy of nutritional support for optimal child growth and development. “Infant and child cognitive development are dependent on adequate nutrition,” the agency warns. Adequate nutrition is especially important during the first two years of life, the NIH explains, ensuring the strengthening of neurological pathways in the brain. In addition, young children need an array of minerals including choline, folate, iodine, iron, vitamin A and zinc, which WIC supports. “Children who don’t receive adequate nutrition are likely to underperform in school and have poor levels of cognition,” the NIH concludes.
Parents, for the most part, champion WIC for the positive difference it makes in their lives and the lives of their children.
Melanie Hall, an Arizona mother of two girls, ages 7 and 4, calls the program her “saving grace.” Each month, she told Truthout, she receives two bottles of apple juice, three gallons of milk, a pound of lentils or beans, three or four boxes of cereal, peanut butter, whole wheat bread, yogurt, cheese and a $24 voucher for fresh fruit and vegetables.
“I work part-time so I can be home with my kids and the benefits have been really helpful,” Hall said. “The program also gave me a breast pump, taught me how to use it and gave me a cookbook geared to making meals for children.”
Hall also receives SNAP but knows that when her youngest daughter turns 5, she will lose eligibility for WIC. “I will have to get food boxes from a local church,” she said. “Those boxes will then become my new saving grace.”
Her experience is not anomalous.
Ashley Trent is a California mother of five whose children range in age from 3 to 17. “I’ve received WIC on and off since my oldest was born in 2006,” she said. “He was born with an intestinal blockage, which needed surgery. Afterward, he needed a special........