According to USDA people are no longer hungry, they have "very low food security"

[dajoki]

Some Americans Lack Food, but USDA Won't Call Them Hungry

By Elizabeth Williamson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, November 16, 2006; Page A01
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/15/AR2006111501621.html?nav=hcmodule

<<snip>>

Every year, the Agriculture Department issues a report that measures Americans' access to food, and it has consistently used the word "hunger" to describe those who can least afford to put food on the table. But not this year.

Mark Nord, the lead author of the report, said "hungry" is "not a scientifically accurate term for the specific phenomenon being measured in the food security survey." Nord, a USDA sociologist, said, "We don't have a measure of that condition."

The USDA said that 12 percent of Americans -- 35 million people -- could not put food on the table at least part of last year. Eleven million of them reported going hungry at times. Beginning this year, the USDA has determined "very low food security" to be a more scientifically palatable description for that group.

<<snip>>

Among several recommendations, the panel suggested that the USDA scrap the word hunger, which "should refer to a potential consequence of food insecurity that, because of prolonged, involuntary lack of food, results in discomfort, illness, weakness, or pain that goes beyond the usual uneasy sensation."

To measure hunger, the USDA determined, the government would have to ask individual people whether "lack of eating led to these more severe conditions," as opposed to asking who can afford to keep food in the house, Nord said.

[Maddy McCall]

1. Christ.

:eyes:

[KingFlorez]

2. Leave it to this administration to try and make hunger sound better

Lacking food security is just a technical way of saying hunger. Instead of admitting there is a problem, they want to try to call it something else.

[acmavm]

3. Dupe. But some people feel this shit's just fine and dandy...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=recent_posts&command=replies&parent_id=2617847&forum=102

[dajoki]

4. Bullshit...

Let Nord eat that!!

[Gormy Cuss]

10. That poster never said it was fine and dandy

The poster tried repeatedly to explain that the terms 'food security' and 'food insecurity' are not new and that they define the range of food issues much better than the word hunger alone, which is correct.
How do I know? I've used the terms food security and food insecurity in professional reports since the 1980s. Professional reports written by or for nonpartisan groups involved in poverty issues and public policy.

The issue with this USDA report is that the term hunger is no longer used to describe the levels of food insecurity.

[rodeodance]

5. Page A01

Thursday, November 16, 2006; Page A01

[Quantess]

6. The problem often isn't

"lack of eating", it's lack of nutrition. They could be eating stale hamburger buns with pancake syrup. So then you could have an overweight person who is malnourished.

[KurtNYC]

12. So true

Food (meaning edible calories) has never been cheaper or more plentiful in the history of mankind. But that doesn't mean that everyone has access to decent food.

[gratuitous]

7. "Hungry" is too easily understood

Dress up the problem in impenetrable anti-matter bureaucratese and hey presto! nobody's suffering from hunger anymore. The same concept worked so well to make the long-term unemployed and underemployed disappear. And the beautiful minds of the overrich haven't been troubled by any of this since.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

8. I think this sounds a lot worse than it probably is.

"Not having access to proper food" and "hungry" are not the same thing at all. A scientific body using more accurate language is not something to get steamed up about.

[dajoki]

9. The administration is...

just trying to use semantics so they don't look as bad.

[Arkana]

11. Kinda like in "This is Spinal Tap"

where the band insists their amp is louder because it goes to 11.

[dajoki]

13. Good one n/t