As child hunger continues to rise to unprecedented levels, the emergency programme of the Congress, created two months ago, reached only a fraction of the 30 million children it was intended to help.
The Pandemic-EBT programme aims to compensate for the decline in school meals coverage by placing their costs on electronic cards that families can use in grocery stores. But assembling lunch lists from thousands of school districts, transferring them to often outdated government computers and issuing specialty cards proved far more difficult than anticipated, leaving millions of needy families waiting to buy food.
In mid-March, Congress approved the event as part of the Families First Programme, the first major package of anti-virus assistance. According to a New York Times analysis, by 15 May, only about 15 per cent of eligible children had received benefits. Only 12 states began sending money, and only Michigan and Rhode Island had finished.
Among the difficulties associated with the pandemic, child hunger stands out for its urgency and symbolic resonance – after decades of exposure and reform, a country with great wealth is still struggling to feed its younger generation. In some places, school meals are so vital that states issue replacement grants in waves to prevent grocery stores from overflowing.
The lag between Congressional action and family food purchases in many places is not so much a history of bureaucratic indifference as it is a testimony to the confusing nature of the American social security system.
“This is why we need a federal nutrition safety net — hunger does not have state borders”, – said Crystal FitzSimons of the Food Research and Action Center, a Washington advocacy group.