Want to eat healthily? Add up to $1.50 a day

[FarCenter]

AFP - A diet of the healthiest food costs about $1.50 (1.10 euros) more per person per day than the least healthiest, according to a survey of 10 wealthy and middle-income countries published on Thursday.

Researchers carried out an overview of 27 previously published investigations into dietary patterns that had solid data about what people ate each day and how much it cost.

The studies were carried out in eight advanced economies and two middle-income countries, Brazil and South Africa.

Diets were rated according to healthiness: eating more fruit, vegetables, fish and nuts ranked higher than consuming more processed foods, meats and refined grains.

On average, a day's worth of the healthiest diet cost about $1.50 more than the least healthiest, the analysis found.

http://www.france24.com/en/20131205-want-eat-healthily-add-150-day

[laundry_queen]

1. Sounds like a piddly amount doesn't it?

Until you realize that's per person. So, for this single mother, to have the healthiest food for my 4 kids and myself would cost me an extra $225/month that I don't have. I try to do my best but I'm already tapped out. Food prices have gone up by 30% in my area since I first was on my own 3 years ago and my child support and alimony is the same. Which means there's NO MORE MONEY for healthier food.

[Warpy]

5. It doesn't work for low wage workers, at all

They're having a hard time getting enough calories that their guts don't hurt and the pain of hunger is one I hope few people at DU share.

That's what today's strike was about. Less than subsistence wages mean exactly that. Workers can't stay alive on them without government assistance and a lot of food pantry help.

[laundry_queen]

7. Yep.

Only works for people who can make up the difference by cutting out movies or dinners at nice restaurants. Those of us who don't do those things anyway don't have things to cut out of our budget.

You are right - there is no way to live on minimum wage anymore without government assistance.

[niyad]

2. of course, if you are living right on the edge, you just might not HAVE that $45/month extra.

if you live in a food desert, an area that has no actual markets, only convenience stores, not a lot of healthy choices, and certainly not terribly affordable.

[Sheepshank]

3. 1FT and 2 PT jobs, a gaggle of kids

and when is a single mom supposed to find the time to shop 3x a week for fresh fruit and veggies and prepare meals?

I know and remember those days when mom was so tired and frustrated she was depressed and could barely function to get her weary ass to work. Asking her to come home and cook for us was never something we would have asked...even at age 4,5. What did we know about nutrition? Absolutely nothing, that's what! we knew how to fill our stomachs with what was at hand. Cooking fish and chicken just was the rare special treat mom *sometimes* found the energy to put together.

[nadinbrzezinski]

4. You might want to try to tell this to the low wage workers I talked to today

Even with SNAP benefits it is a struggle.

[upi402]

6. Vegetables and fruit are less nutritious now

than they were. So we need to add multiple vitamins so Monsanto can continue its factory farming and scoop in the cash.

[Warren DeMontague]

8. I wonder how many of those people could get window planter boxes and grow, say, lettuce?

It's funny that arugula is supposed to be some hoity-toity elite whole foods expensive yuppie signifier. I've found that it's about the easiest fucking thing to grow, even (especially, because it doesn't bolt then) in the winter when almost nothing else will.

And it self-seeds like a mother. Buy one packet of seeds and you're good indefinitely.

I wouldn't eat an entire salad full of the stuff, but it sure spices up a head of romaine and a cucumber.