The COVID-19 pandemic has a major impact on everyone’s standard of living. Millions of people have lost their jobs, and are hanging on the bare minimum owing to stress, depression, and lack of financial support. The pandemic has tipped people’s lives to the point where they are sleeping hungry at night.  In America, food insecurity has become a major widespread national issue sparing not even the wealthiest regions. The majority of the households reported that they are facing food shortages in their household and have to rely upon hunger reliefs and food banks. Approximately 60,000 households have been served by the San Francisco-Marin Food Bank, which works in some of the wealthiest US counties – San Francisco and Marin – double its pre-Covid average, says its executive director, Paul Ash. However, food insecurity is not a new issue to the people, it is a long-troubled problem. So it comes as no surprise that many reports indicate that food insecurity has doubled over the past few years, especially since last year.

The key causes behind hunger are economic conditions, says Diane Whitmore Schanzenbach, an economist, and director of the Center for Policy Analysis of Northwestern University. At the end of March, when pandemic lockdowns made the US economy stumble, food insecurity rates spiked. Many parents had to find babysitters when schools closed, or determine if one parent will stop working to stay home and take care of the kids – decisions that also result in less income, says Montgomery, from Loudoun Hunger Relief. There is a special danger for some sub-populations of older adults. According to UCLA’s Williams Institute, the amount of LGBT people who have not had enough food to eat is more than double the proportion of food insecurity in the general population. LGBT adults experience food insecurity at higher rates than non-LGBT adults and engage in SNAP. Add risk from other diseases such as diabetes or heart disease with weakened immune systems, and it is not difficult to see why some elders would rather risk going hungry than going to the grocery store.

According to a study published in the Journal of the American Geriatric’s Society, food insecurity among older adults in the United States doubled from 2007 to 2016. This study highlights how food insecurity is a major health concern among older adults. The correlation between food insecurity and lower diet quality scores observed may be a possible cause for aging-related conditions associated with food insecurity, such as functional limitations, risks of chronic disease, and cognitive impairment, according to the researchers.