A city cannot thrive if its people cannot. Therefore, it is the job of the city to do its best to keep its citizens healthy and happy, so that they can be fully functioning members of society. For New York City, keeping a population of over 8 million people healthy is a challenge, and here are some of the reasons.
First and foremost, the role of primary care doctors is to maintain the public health of the city that they provide for. The problem is that there are not nearly enough primary care physicians. In fact, if the primary care system remains the same as today, it is estimated that there would be shortage of over 20,000 primary care physicians by 2020 [1]. For a medical student with insurmountable debt, the financial appeal of specialization is obvious, but unfortunately a lack of primary care doctors could lead not only to overcrowded offices, but a situation where the quality of primary healthcare is compromised.
Aside from the accessibility of doctors, accessibility of affordable, fresh food is another huge issue in the United States. According the the USDA, 23.5 million people live in “food deserts”, defined as low-income areas in which the closest supermarket is, in urban areas, a mile away. One might think that in a city as dense as New York, this isn’t possible. However, it is estimated that 750,000 New Yorkers currently live in food deserts [2]. When the most affordable way to get your daily caloric intake is sugary drinks, snacks and hearty New York City bagels, it is no surprise that a lack of supermarkets around their home makes citizens 25% more likely not to follow a healthy diet [3]. In turn, this lack of availability of food has been repeatedly correlated to development of type-2 diabetes [3].
There is no question that reforms need to be made in each of these areas, but I think food deserts can be addressed most immediately. While the city has implemented Green Carts [2], and Green Markets which bring affordable produce to the city’s food deserts, they are still few and far-between. While starting ones own garden, as Dr. Thomas Blaine suggests [3], may not be feasible in the typical New York City apartment life-style, community gardens and even school green-houses could be implemented in these areas. In this way, residents would not have to wait for the produce trucks or farmers markets to appear. I also think that it is important to promote these trucks and gardens, providing community outreach to teach about the benefits of fresh food, and possibly even holding free lessons in cooking and gardening to show residents how to get the most out of this produce for their family.
Another option would be to put a tax on hyper-processed snacks, to promote the healthier foods that are available. Ideally, this would reduce consumption of these more unhealthy food and drinks, and in turn provide the funds to subsidize the healthier food that is currently unaffordable to many. In short it would create a system where the economy was “profiting from the foods that make us sick and use the money to make us healthy” [4].
[1] http://bhpr.hrsa.gov/healthworkforce/supplydemand/usworkforce/primarycare/
[2] http://www.foodispower.org/food-deserts/
[3] http://www.diabetesforecast.org/2013/sep/food-deserts-mar-the-land-of-plenty.html
[4] http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/24/opinion/sunday/24bittman.html?_r=1
Hello Skye. The solutions you present for the problem of food deserts seem like a good idea. People definitely should have greater access to healthy foods. However, I think to maximize the effectiveness of that idea, it needs a work-life balance aspect. Many people probably choose to eat healthy food not just because it’s more available, but also because they can obtain it faster. When you combine long hours with a long commute, potentially raising children, and all the other things in daily life, sometimes one will just want to sit back with some pizza and watch television during the little free time he or she has as opposed to spending it cooking. Alternately one could be busy doing something important at home and prefer quickly ordering takeout to going through the process of making something healthier. Therefore, as an addition to the cooking classes, there should be a time management component that teaches people how to prepare food and still have time for other things. This could include lessons on seasoning all the meat and whatever else one plans to make on the night of a weekend so that it’s easier to prepare later. It could also include lessons on healthy meals that can be made even faster than it takes the average delivery person to get to one’s house.