Food Deserts in the City (Part 1)

  • The Chene-Ferry market was once a bustling center of commerce in this Detroit neighborhood. It closed in the 1970s. There are no major chain grocery stores to serve the community, so many people shop for food at liquor and convenience stores. (Photo by Marla Collum)

Most of us don’t have to think too much if we
want fresh fruits, vegetables and other foods. We
drive to the supermarket or farmers’ market and find
whatever we’re looking to buy. But for many people
living in the inner city, it can be tough to find
fresh foods. Julie Grant reports that can lead to
health problems:

Transcript

Most of us don’t have to think too much if we
want fresh fruits, vegetables and other foods. We
drive to the supermarket or farmers’ market and find
whatever we’re looking to buy. But for many people
living in the inner city, it can be tough to find
fresh foods. Julie Grant reports that can lead to
health problems:



Neighbors having been counting down the days for this store to
open. The bright lights, the shiny floors, 217,000-square feet
of retail and grocery. This Wal-Mart Supercenter offers produce
bins overflowing with dark leafy kale, imported plantains, and a
rainbow of green, yellow and red apples. Mother of two Dionne
Smith says she’s glad it’s here:


“I was looking at the prices. I mean because I was looking at this. In a regular store that’s
like 2 dollars 79 cents. Here it’s a dollar-fifty. So it’s
pretty good.”


“You’re looking at the Velveeta Mac n’ Cheese?”


“Mmm hmm.”


This Wal-mart is located on the south edge of Cleveland. It’s
part of the first new shopping center in the city limits in
decades. But it’s close to the suburbs. Not an easy trip from most
of the low income neighborhoods to the northeast – places where
it’s tough to find fresh foods.


In this poorer area, a lot of people who come to see dietitian
Cheri Collier have problems with diabetes, heart disease and
obesity. Collier says the health center opened adjacent to a
supermarket a few years ago. She planned to show people
firsthand how to improve their diets:


“I was very excited about the idea of having grocery store nearby.
Because I felt it was easier to teach people how to shop by having live
models. Taking you into the grocery store, showing which aisles have the appropriate foods, how to pick food labels, how to shop based on
what’s available for you in the area that you’re living.”


But it didn’t work out. Just six months after the health center
opened, the supermarket closed.


Today Collier looks around at what’s left on the food landscape near her health center:


“We got a couple of beverage stores, check cashing stores. Might
have beverages or food, and snacks in there. We’ve got
McDonald’s, Burger King, Subway, KFC. Those are the main
things we see right away… Lot of stuff you can get that’s
quick. And you have United Convenient Market, has a lot of convenience-type foods. Some snacks, and some alcohol of course, and some pops and beverages. The two grocery stores we had in the area
are closed down.”


Collier takes us to what’s now called the “grocery store” in this
neighborhood. You can buy milk here. And cereal. Juice. But
there is no produce aisle. No fresh fruits or vegetables. Only
canned vegetables. No fresh meat. Collier picks up a can of
something called “potted meat” – and says this is the kind of
food that can lead to her clients’ health problems:


“It has chicken. Pork skin. And that’s my concern because that
skin is high in fat and that’s what giving them a lot of extra
cholesterol and saturated fat. So not only a person may think
they’re getting chicken, they’re actually getting chicken with pork
fat all over it. So it’s not the healthiest option.”


Collier tries to educate her clients about the high fat and salt
content in potted meats, processed boxed foods, and even many
canned vegetables. She says people on limited incomes buy these
foods because that’s what’s available:


“Someone just said earlier, ‘Because I’m in the neighborhood
and I can get to that store and get what I need.’ So to them it’s
like, I can get more of these and still have money left over to
buy something else I want.”


That’s one reason why stores sell cheap processed foods in poor
inner city neighborhoods, while the supermarkets with fresh foods
close down.


Getting quality produce often depends on the wealth of your neighborhood. Researchers have found that again and again. Dr.
Ana Diez-Roux is with the University of Michigan:


“It’s like a vicious cycle. Stores offer what people want to
buy, but people can only buy what the stores offer. So it
becomes a self-perpetuating cycle.”


And Diez-Roux says without supermarkets or other ways to get
fresh produce and meats, certain people will face more health
problems:


“In particular, healthy food options are less available in poor
and minority neighborhoods then they are in wealthy and white
neighborhoods.”


Diez-Roux says that’s one reason poor neighborhoods have higher rates
of diabetes, obesity, and cardiovascular disease. She says
public policy is starting to address this problem in two ways: by
educating consumers and providing incentives to stores to carry
healthier foods in poor neighborhoods.


But progress is slow. Eating habits are hard to change. And
stores don’t want to stock perishables that don’t sell.


For the Environment Report, I’m Julie Grant.

Related Links

Study: Life Spans Increase as Soot Decreases

A new study says when air pollution in cities decline, the number of premature deaths goes down as well. The GLRC’s Mark Brush reports:

Transcript

A new study says when air pollution in cities decline, the number of pre-
mature deaths goes down as well. The GLRC’s Mark Brush reports:


The study tracked around 8,000 people from 1974 to 1998. In that time,
air pollution levels dropped, and researchers say the number of premature deaths
decreased over time as well.


Francine Laden is the lead author of the study published in the American
Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine. She says small air
pollution particles, such as soot, cause health complications:


“What’s happening is that these particles are very, very tiny, and they get
very deep into the lung. And when they get deep into the alveoli and the
lung, they irritate the lung and can cause respiratory disease, and they
can also get into the bloodstream and then affect factors that are
associated with cardiovascular or heart disease.”


This study supports earlier findings that reduced air pollution increases
life spans. Laden says more progress can be made in cleaning up the
nation’s air, and thereby extending the lives of more people.


For the GLRC, I’m Mark Brush.

Related Links

Solution for Arsenic in Drinking Water?

  • Researchers from the University of Illinois have discovered a way to remove arsenic from drinking water at its source. (photo by David Guglielmo)

Researchers believe they have found a way to reduce
arsenic levels in drinking water. They say, for people to drink water from wells or aquifers, the solution starts at the source. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jeff Bossert explains:

Transcript

Researchers believe they have found a way to reduce arsenic levels in drinking water. They say, for people to drink water from wells or aquifers, the solution starts at the source. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Jeff Bossert explains:


Chronic exposure to arsenic in drinking water has been linked to a variety of health concerns, including hypertension, cardiovascular disease, and cancer.


Researchers from the University of Illinois collected groundwater samples from 21 wells. They found that the wells with almost no arsenic in the water also contained high levels of sulphate-reducing bacteria, which convert the arsenic into a solid, where it drops out of the water. Dr. Craig Bethke led the study.


“What we’re saying is that if there’s sulfate in the water, then there’s probably sulfate-reducing bacteria active in the subsurface, and that means that a simple field test, which is very inexpensive and very rapid to protect sulfate, could identify safe water sources.”


Bethke says places where aresenic levels are high, sulphate salts, such as gypsum and calcium sulphate, can be injected underground to reduce arsenic levels.


Researchers say this information could prove to be invaluable in places where aresenic contamination is a major problem, including parts of the U.S., Australia, and Mongolia. The researchers’ findings were published in the journal Geology.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Jeff Bossert.

Related Links

A Closer Look at Mercury Hair Test

  • Hair is now a way to test people for mercury levels, as opposed to more invasive tests of blood and urine. (Photo by Anna Miller)

Health officials are experimenting with another way to gauge the level of mercury in people who eat a lot of fish. The only test sample needed is… hair. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach
reports:

Transcript

Health officials are experimenting with another way to gauge the level of mercury in people who eat a lot of fish. The only test sample needed is… hair. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chuck Quirmbach reports:


Doctors can already test your blood and urine for mercury. Now, as a less invasive technique, some health officials can test the hair near your scalp for the toxic chemical. There’s some debate over the quality of the tests, the lab analyses, and over what a high test reading means. The federal health warning for mercury in hair is one part per million. But that’s for susceptible populations like an unborn fetus.


Jack Spengler is a professor of environmental health at Harvard University. he recently ate a lot of fish and says his hair tested out at 3 parts per million of mercury.


“But I’m not going apoplectic about it because I know if I just watch my consumption, I can moderate that over time… and there’s that safety margin…that I suspect I’d have to be much higher for much longer to really have symptoms. ”

Prolonged high levels of the most toxic form of mercury, methyl mercury can trigger various health problems in adults such as memory loss and cardiovascular damage.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Chuck Quirmbach.

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