Impact of the expiration of temporary pandemic SNAP benefits on the healthfulness of supermarket food purchases

临时大流行 SNAP 福利到期对超市食品采购健康性的影响

• 批准号: 10835393
• 负责人: Joshua Petimar
• 金额: $ 84.85万
• 依托单位: HARVARD PILGRIM HEALTH CARE, INC.
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2023-09-21 至 2027-06-30
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10835393
• 关键词: Affect; Black race; COVID-19 pandemic; Characteristics; Chronic Disease; Communities; Data; Economics; Emergency Situation; Employment; Enrollment; Ensure; Ethnic Origin; Food; Food Access; Food Preferences; Future; Health; Health Food; Hispanic; Household; Individual; Inequity; Interruption; Intervention; Interview; Link; Low Income Population; Low income; Measures; Methods; Natural experiment; Not Hispanic or Latino; Nutritional; Participant; Pattern; Persons; Policies; Policy Maker; Population; Poverty; Price; Process; Quasi-experiment; Race; Research; Research Design; Rural; Sales; Series; Source; Stress; Structure; Supermarket; Surveys; System; Time; Underserved Population; Unemployment; cohort; cooking; coping; economic disparity; experience; expiration; food security; good diet; health disparity; health disparity populations; indexing; interest; large datasets; longitudinal analysis; nutrition; pandemic disease; pre-pandemic; programs; response; rural residence; rurality; social; study population; supply chain; underserved community

PROJECT SUMMARY The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) is the largest food security program for lower-income households in the U.S., providing financial benefits for grocery purchases to nearly 42 million people (1 in 8). SNAP benefit amounts increased substantially starting in March 2020, most of which was driven by temporary emergency allotments (i.e., supplemental benefits), to bolster food security in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and to ensure participants could afford a healthy diet. These emergency benefits expired across all states in March 2023, a policy that is estimated to have reduced benefits by an average of $175 per household, a ~33% decline. The sudden end of SNAP emergency allotments represents the largest-ever universal reduction in SNAP benefits and could have a major impact on households’ food purchases and their subsequent health. However, this has not been investigated to date. This study will make a significant contribution by evaluating the impact of the expiration of SNAP emergency allotments on participants’ food purchase quality overall, among historically underserved groups with worse food access and pre-pandemic inequities in nutrition-related chronic disease, and in the context of concurrent economic, social, community, and retail factors. We will use a mixed- methods approach that combines a natural experiment of household purchases with qualitative interviews of SNAP participants and those working in the larger food system. In Aim 1, we will analyze longitudinal, loyalty- linked sales data on >440,000 customers of a large Northeast supermarket chain who made purchases from November 2021-February 2023 (16 months before the end of SNAP emergency allotments). We will use controlled interrupted time series (CITS), a quasi-experimental method, to estimate the effect of the end of SNAP emergency allotments on several indices of food purchase quality from April 2023-March 2024 (12 months after the end of allotments) among SNAP-participating households (intervention) vs. non-participating households (control). In Aim 2, we will enroll a cohort of 2,500 lower-income shoppers who shop at the chain and whose purchases can be identified by loyalty number. We will assess household-level data via online surveys and use CITS to examine associations between the end of SNAP emergency allotments and supermarket food purchase quality by rurality, race/ethnicity, and economic stability. In Aim 3, we will explore individual-level factors (e.g., use of other assistance programs, cooking norms, food preferences) by conducting semi-structured qualitative interviews among 45-75 participants from the cohort in Aim 2 who participate in SNAP and represent rural, Black, and Hispanic demographic segments of the study population. We will explore system-level factors (e.g., food availability, supply chains, pandemic era SNAP policy rollout) via interviews with representatives from SNAP implementing agencies, supermarket retailers, and food pantries from within each of the communities of interest. This research will generate timely, rigorous evidence on the nutritional impact of this substantial change to SNAP benefits, which will be useful to policymakers to help guide future program changes.

项目摘要 补充营养援助计划（SNAP）是低收入的最大粮食安全计划 美国的家庭为近4200万人提供了杂货购买的经济利益（8分之一）。 从2020年3月开始，SNAP福利金额大大增加，其中大多数是由临时驱动的 紧急分配（即补充福利），以响应COVID-19 大流行，并确保参与者能够负担健康的饮食。这些紧急福利在所有人中到期 各州在2023年3月，据估计，该政策平均每个家庭的福利降低了175美元， 下降约33％。紧急分配的突然结束代表了有史以来最大的普遍减少 在快照福利中，可能会对家庭的食物购买及其后续健康产生重大影响。 但是，迄今为止尚未对此进行调查。这项研究将通过评估 SNAP紧急分配到期对参与者的食品购买质量的影响，总体上 历史上服务不足的群体在营养有关的慢性方 疾病，以及并发的经济，社会，社区和零售因素。我们将使用混合 方法方法将家庭购买的自然实验与定性访谈结合在一起 捕捉参与者和在较大食品系统中工作的参与者。在AIM 1中，我们将分析纵向，忠诚度 - 链接到> 440,000个大型东北超市连锁店的客户的销售数据，他们从 2023年11月至2023年2月（紧急拨款结束前16个月）。我们将使用 受控中断的时间序列（CITS）是一种准实验方法，以估计快速结束的效果 从2023年4月至3月（1224年4月）（12个月后），紧急分配食品购买质量的几个指数 分配的终结）参与式家庭（干预）与非参与家庭 （控制）。在AIM 2中，我们将注册2,500家在连锁店购物的低收入购物者和谁 购买可以通过忠诚度数字来识别。我们将通过在线调查评估家庭级数据并使用 CITS检查紧急分配与超市食品的结束之间的关联 质量通过粗糙度，种族/种族和经济稳定性。在AIM 3中，我们将探索个人级别的因素（例如， 通过进行半结构化定性，使用其他援助计划，烹饪规范和食物偏好） 来自AIM 2中队列中的45-75名参与者的访谈，他们参与SNAP并代表乡村，黑色， 和研究人群的西班牙人口统计领域。我们将探索系统级因素（例如食物 可用性，供应链，大流行擦除扣除策略推出）通过snap的访谈 来自每个社区内部的实施机构，超市零售商和食品储藏室。 这项研究将及时，严格地证明这种重大变化以捕捉的营养影响 好处，这对政策制定者有用，以帮助指导未来的计划更改。