Doctors say cutting food stamps could backfire

[progree]

Source: Associated Press

Doctors are warning that if Congress cuts food stamps, the federal government could be socked with bigger health bills. Maybe not immediately, they say, but over time if the poor wind up in doctors' offices or hospitals as a result. Among the health risks of hunger are spiked rates of diabetes and developmental problems for young children down the road.

... Last year, research from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and The Pew Charitable Trusts estimated that a cut of $2 billion a year in food stamps could trigger in an increase of $15 billion in medical costs for diabetes over the next decade.

Other research shows children from food-insecure families are 30 percent more likely to have been hospitalized for a range of illnesses. But after a temporary boost in benefits from the 2009 economic stimulus, children whose families used food stamps were significantly more likely to be well than kids in low-income families that didn't participate, Children's HealthWatch found. About half of food stamp recipients are children, and 10 percent are elderly

... Dr. Thomas McInerny, past president of the American Academy of Pediatrics, said too often, poor families buy cheap, high-calorie junk food because it's filling, but it lacks nutrients needed for proper child development. The two main consequences are later-in-life diabetes, and iron deficiency that, especially in the first three years of life, can damage a developing brain so that children have trouble learning in school, he said.


Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/doctors-cutting-food-stamps-could-backfire-192904431--finance.html

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Some other studies described that I couldn't fit in the 4 paragraph limit. All-in-all a lot of evidence that cutting food stamps will cost the government a lot more money than it "saves", as well as of course harming family budgets and health.

[delrem]

1. An argument from pure economics doesn't work.

It costs the gov't more to treat the people that the gov't deliberately injures by cost-cutting? Not if the gov't goes on to cost-cut on those treatments, effectively ending them - along with every other "entitlement".

[sakabatou]

2. "Fuck the poor AND doctors!" - GOP

[truthisfreedom]

3. Don't even try to explain cause and effect to a republican.

It's like talking to a pole cat.

[Nika]

4. It is so obvious that good nutrition is a foundation these cuts have taken a sledgehammer to.

But there are other major problems that have developed in the past few decades such as 'food deserts;' large areas in cities where the poor have no access even to good grocery stores that need to be addressed too besides these foolish cuts to the SNAP program.

There is too little money in the pockets for people without food stamps who live in food deserts filled with fast food joints for people to eat in a healthy way. These cuts to SNAP program tat have been made not only need to be restored, the program needs to be funded at a better level then it was.

And the problem of fast food and food deserts where healthy food is almost impossible to find needs to be attacked vigorously.

[Kablooie]

5. They misinterpret the reason for the food stamp cuts.

It has nothing to do with saving money.
It's about making poor people suffer.
If it costs more money, so be it but the poor must be punished for being poor.

That's the true Republican way.

[TheOldDancingBear]

7. Any country club Republican would tell you the same:

What's the point of having money if you can't enjoy the wailing cries of misery coming from the destitute masses being crushed beneath your cleated golf shoes?

The wealthy require the continual spectacle of poverty and human suffering because they find in it a constant reassurance of God's favored disposition toward them for the "moral superiority" of their character over the vulgar and wicked underclasses who suffer God's wrath. It is psychologically reassuring for the rich to view the suffering of the less fortunate as a kind of morality drama in which they themselves are the hero protagonists.

As for the reactionary working class Tea Bag Republicans, like any abused child they are just happy to see someone else getting beaten up worse then they've been beaten. As any po-white-trash racist Kluxer will tell you, nothing gives a powerless person a thrill quite like being able to kick the crap out of someone that's even more powerless then yourself.

Republican ideology is a form of mental illness, and taking food out of the mouths of the poor satisfies the pathological psychological needs of both types of Republicans.

[frylock]

11. +1

[jtuck004]

6. If they cared about such logic there would be free condoms in every school.

On the other hand, if there is a war, perhaps they only people fit enough to go will be the children of those wealthy enough for a decent diet...

[Sunlei]

8. private for profit creates more sick people to 'treat' /w state/federal money = more private profit!

Of course the most 'free gov. money' is from the under 18 children for medical treatment and foster care system. Keep pushing out those babies! they're worth millions in state and federal $$$$$$$

Then they can toss the toothless, undereducated 18+ to the private for profit prisons. & make 45k a year each, off of them.

[Turbineguy]

9. Repubs don't care about costs.

Just so long as somebody suffers.

[Dopers_Greed]

10. True...though this brings up an argument against food stamps...

Or...at least for reform...

The food stamp demographic is growing due to poverty-level wages, and is largely being targeted by the junk food lobby. Wal-Mart is also a heavy proponent of food stamps, as they reap most of the benefits from them. It allows them to pay their workers less, and a huge part of their customer base is on assistance. These corporate cartels benefit more from government assistance than the people who actually receive it.

I personally think that food stamps should be expanded, but also reformed to heavily restrict what kinds of things they should buy. No processed foods, sugary snacks, sodas, etc. Then, the taxes on those items should be raised heavily and used to pay for universal healthcare.

[Prophet 451]

12. That's not a bug, that's a feature

The objective isn't to save money, it's to punish the poor for being poor.