Understanding Food Insecurity and Participation in Food Assistance Programs among Hispanic/Latino Residents of Hialeah, Florida, before and during the COVID-19 Pandemic

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The 63.6 million Hispanic individuals living in the United States constitute the largest ethnic or racial minority group in the country. Hispanic/Latino households report a high prevalence of food insecurity, and often, food-insecure individuals cope by turning to emergency and federal food assistance programs for immediate or long-term assistance. This paper focuses on Hialeah, Florida, a predominantly Hispanic/Latino city in Miami-Dade County. It examines which demographic factors influence participation in food assistance programs and the occurrences of periods of disrupted food access. This study examines two questions: (1) What factors are associated with participation in food assistance programs? (2) To what extent did study participants use food assistance programs before and during the COVID-19 pandemic? We conducted a survey and collected 684 responses from April to August 2022. We gathered data on participants’ identities, household attributes, and their usage of federal and emergency food assistance programs. We used Pearson’s chi-square tests to identify significant associations between food assistance usage, food access, and respondents’ demographic characteristics. We also used binary logistic regression models to assess probabilities. The findings of this research are significant, indicating that the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated food access challenges in Hispanic/Latino households in 2022. The data also revealed that low-income households, respondents below the age of 40, individuals born in the United States, those with low educational attainment, and those living in multifamily households had the highest likelihood of using food assistance programs. Single- and non-single-parent households, employment status, languages spoken at home, and number of children in the household were also statistically significant factors in predicting food assistance usage. This research provides valuable insights into how individuals in a city responded to the pandemic by utilizing food assistance programs.