How doctors can help end food insecurity

Footballer Marcus Rashford’s outspoken campaigning over the past 12 months has made food insecurity a high profile issue in the UK. But researchers at the department of nutritional sciences at the University of Toronto have been closely monitoring food insecurity’s effects on children for a quarter of a century.

In 1994 the country’s national longitudinal survey of children and youth added “child hunger” to its list of determinants of health.1 That survey showed clearly that, as children who experienced hunger became young adults, they were more likely to face a range of health problems, including asthma and depression.

They were also more likely to face various other problems, including low academic achievement and a higher risk of teenage motherhood, Valerie Tarasuk, professor of nutritional science at the University …