When there’s not enough food to go around

As the COVID-19 pandemic took hold and worsened in 2020, U.S. officials took steps to stop or slow the spread of the deadly virus. Those efforts took their own toll. Businesses closed, employees lost jobs or hours, costs rose, supply chains choked and many households felt an intensifying squeeze from all angles. For many in poverty and the working poor, the peril was existential.

To address some of that pain, Congress passed emergency legislation in March 2020 to expand the federal Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as food stamps. SNAP subsidies help eligible low-income households buy food.

Those emergency allotments raised every participating household's monthly benefit by at least $95. When they ended in March 2023, the average household lost about $179 a month, the largest single benefit reduction in the program's history.

In findings published online last month in JAMA Internal Medicine, University of Delaware researcher Tarang Parekh explored what happened to one population - people with disabilities - when those extended SNAP benefits expired.