Difference We Make

Leading causes of death in Doña Ana County related to lifestyle, diet and nutrition from 1994-1996 included heart disease, cancer, cerebrovascular disease, diabetes, and cirrhosis of the liver, atherosclerosis, and alcoholism. In 1994, an average of 11,030 families received food stamps on a monthly basis. Because of multiple barriers with respect to low-income families there is a need to develop and provide nutrition education. Low-income families are not receiving the necessary nutrition education especially with regard to dietary needs, food preparation and safety and the ability to successfully utilize existing food assistance programs. This need lies in part with ethnicity and cultural norms as well as socioeconomic ability.

According to the 2000 U.S. census, New Mexico had the third highest poverty rate in the nation at eighteen percent. Because hunger is always a direct consequence of poverty, New Mexico’s high rate of poverty results in our state having the highest rate of food in-security in the nation and the third highest rate of hunger in the nation. Unfortunately, children represent a large portion of the people living in poverty in New Mexico, which has the highest rate of child poverty (26%) in the nation. New Mexico’s rate of child poverty is fifty percent higher than the national average. In many cases children do not eat enough to sustain health and to grow and develop at optimal levels. Even more com-monly, individuals make poor food choices that can lead to chronic disease problems such as obesity, diabetes and heart disease.

To alleviate this problem, NMSU Cooperative Extension Service’s ICAN program reaches out to the high-risk population through various educational programs and nutri-tion awareness. After attending ICAN classes, eighty percent of participants improve their nutritional practices, such as ensuring that their children eat breakfast and improving food-resource management by comparing prices or planning meals. ICAN also helps re-duce health care costs by decreasing diet-related diseases, which include; cancer, diabe-tes, osteoporosis, heart disease, and low birth weight. The estimated cost per patient per year with just one of these ailments is between $11,500 and $30,000. Participation in the ICAN program is a proactive approach to significantly reducing obesity-related diseases, which the National Institutes of Health attributes to costing in excess of one hundred bil-lion dollars annually.