Geospatial Analysis of Food Insecurity and Adverse Human Health Outcomes in the United States

Abstract

Previous studies have reported that around 33 million people in the United States are food insecure, potentially leading to several health outcomes. This study aimed to evaluate the geospatial variation of food insecurity and its association with adverse human health outcomes at the state resolution in the United States. The adverse human health outcomes include diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. Data sets on diabetes and cardiovascular diseases were compiled from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Wonder database on chronic conditions. The food insecurity data was accessed from the USDA, which compiles the responses to household surveys from the Census Bureau. Mixed-effects regression models were used in this study to analyze the relationships between food insecurity and diabetes, and food insecurity and cardiovascular diseases. The incidence rate ratio was also estimated with 95% confidence intervals for both diabetes and cardiovascular diseases, comparing high food insecurity profiles to low food insecurity profiles. Food insecurity, diabetes, and cardiovascular diseases showed significantly higher rates in the southern part of the United States relative to other regions. Food insecurity showed significant associations with diabetes and cardiovascular diseases at a p-value < 0.001. The 95% confidence interval of the incidence rate ratio was estimated as [1.198 1.234] for diabetes incidence and [1.033 1.091] for cardiovascular diseases, indicating a significant increase in both health outcomes while moving from a low food insecurity to a high food insecurity profile.