The Health of Those Who Feed Us: an Assessment of Health Inequities Along the United States Food Chain.

Details

• Alternative Title:
  International Journal of Social Determinants of Health and Health Services, 2025, v. 55, no. 2: The Health of Those Who Feed Us: an Assessment of Health Inequities Along the United States Food Chain.
• Journal Article:
  International Journal of Social Determinants of Health and Health Services
• Personal Author:
  Vignola, Emilia F ; Li, Jia ; Silver, Sharon R ; Baron, Sherry
• Description:
  While the health of all depends on the food chain, few studies have focused systematically on the health of food chain workers themselves (production, manufacturing, wholesale, retail, and commercial and institutional services). In this study we used 2018 and 2019 data from the Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS) to examine health-related metrics of food chain workers, combined and by industry sector, compared to non-food chain workers, among 32 U.S. states. Logistic regression indicated U.S. food chain workers had higher prevalences of barriers to health care access, smoking, no physical exercise, and poor self-reported health than all other workers. Patterns were similar among food chain workers in all industry sectors except wholesale. Additionally, commercial food services workers had higher prevalence of poor mental health, while institutional food services workers had higher prevalences of obesity, diabetes, and hypertension than all other workers. We discuss implications of these results for interventions, with specific attention to improving employment conditions. Food chain worker health is critical for food system sustainability and population health equity.
• Content Notes:
  Author manuscript
• Subjects:
  • Humans
  • Female
  • Male
  • Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System
  • Adult
  • Middle Aged
  • Health Status Disparities
  • Health Services Accessibility
  • Food Services
  • Food Industry
  More +
• Keywords:
  • food workers
  • food chain
  • healthcare access
  • health status
  • employment conditions
• Source:
  International Journal of Social Determinants of Health and Health Services, 2025, v. 55, no. 2
• DOI:
  https://doi.org/10.1177/27551938241285109
• ISSN:
  2755-1938 ; 2755-1946
• Pubmed ID:
  39370891
• Pubmed Central ID:
  PMC11973228
• Document Type:
  Text
• Funding:
  CC999999/ImCDC/Intramural CDC HHSUnited States/
• Genre:
  Journal Article
• Place as Subject:
  United States
• Pages in Document:
  148-161 (21 pdf pages)
• Volume:
  55
• Issue:
  2
• Download URL:
  https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/261993/cdc_261993_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 413.64 KB]
• Collection(s):
  CDC Public Access
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha-512:a5755c31140b33182c3daa7b6d99c6b0ee5fdcbfe2719fc1158ef0f6458f3a89fb53bf429b7dc1bdf72f2759344c5860451e37d19205cd2d058ea197394a1b6d