EPP Issues & Resources

Healthy Food

As places of healing, hospitals have a natural incentive to provide food that is healthy for people and the environment in which we live. Food supply can be met in a variety of ways which have consequences in terms of nutrition, disease risk, public health, environmental health, social and economic well being. These are linked in complex ways – from the way food is grown, to the way it’s packaged, shipped, consumed and discarded, hospitals' food purchasing decisions can play an important role, both directly and indirectly, in ecological health.

Conventional food production is pesticide intensive, frequently contaminating groundwater and with many occupational hazards. Rainfall frequently contains a variety of agricultural pesticides. Foods may be contaminated with pesticide residues above acceptable food safety limits. Imported foods may be contaminated with undue pesticide residue including pesticides banned domestically (such as DDT).

Widespread use of antibiotics in meat production is raising concerns of antibiotic resistance. Of the antibiotics fed to animals, 25-75% passes unchanged into animal waste. Meat can and does become contaminated during slaughter and meat processing. Often spread onto fields or sold as fertilizer, manure can contaminate surface or groundwater with antibiotic-resistant bacteria. The air from livestock barns using antibiotic feeds can contain several times the concentration of antibiotic resistant bacteria as to other livestock facilities. Widespread use of pesticides is causing wide-ranging ecological health impacts. Increased use of organic foods and sustainable agriculture assists in minimizing these impacts.

Current Trends

• FoodMed conferences on healthy healthcare food are being held across the country. The first FoodMed, held November 17, 2005 in California.
• The National Catholic Rural Life Conference has well developed polices on food and agriculture www.ncrlc.com/Agric-and-Food-Issues.html.
• The Green Guide for Healthcare Construction includes three food related credits. Two are specific to purchasing and include credits for meat raised without antibiotics, the other for organic and/or locally produced food. The third credit is for food waste composting.
• National groups, such as Keep Antibiotics Working, are collaborating on projects to address food related environmental issues.

Consorta supports Health Care Without Harm’s programs to help hospitals adopt food procurement policies that:

• provide nutritionally improved food for patients, staff, visitors, and the general public, and
• create food systems which are ecologically sound, economically viable, and socially responsible.

Key Resources from HCWH:

• Food & Food Purchasing: A Role for Health Care
• Healthy Food in Health Care: A Menu of Options
• Antibiotic Resistance Fact Sheet
• HCWH’s Statement on Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH)

To learn how hospitals are getting started, see HCWH’s Case Studies and Other Resources.

For information about healthy food products on contract with Consorta, contact Laura Wenger at lwenger@consorta.com.