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A latest article within the Journal of Epidemiology and Neighborhood Well being evaluates college meal packages in 4 main international cities and the way they work to advance kids’s well being.
For the paper, a staff of researchers together with Affiliate Professor Nevin Cohen analyzed packages in Vienna, Copenhagen, Madrid, and New York Metropolis between 2014 and 2024, specializing in vitamin, sustainability and accessibility for susceptible kids. They discovered that well-designed college meal programs not solely scale back meals insecurity but additionally promote more healthy diets, help sustainable meals provide chains and assist handle local weather change.
The cities make use of completely different approaches to complete college meals coverage, Cohen says. European cities usually use focused subsidies primarily based on family revenue whereas New York Metropolis implements common free college meals for 900,000 college students, eliminating means-testing and decreasing stigma.
All cities combine meals training into curricula and sustainability initiatives together with natural procurement (Vienna reaching 50% natural content material, Copenhagen utilizing 90% natural merchandise), plant-forward menus, and local weather commitments just like the Coolfood Pledge focusing on 25% reductions in food-related greenhouse gasoline emissions by 2030.
Analysis exhibits common free college meals can enhance tutorial achievement, improve meals participation, improve weight loss program high quality, and scale back stigma, whereas demonstrating that environmental and social aims might be mutually reinforcing—similar to Copenhagen’s sustainable practices mixed with income-based subsidies serving susceptible populations.
“For public health professionals, these findings suggest that school meal programs should be viewed as comprehensive interventions capable of addressing nutrition, environmental health, and health equity simultaneously, making them powerful tools for improving childhood poverty, food insecurity, and climate change in urban populations,” Cohen says.
Extra info:
Manuel Franco et al, Defending kids’s well being via common and sustainable college meals: European and US city coverage experiences, Journal of Epidemiology and Neighborhood Well being (2025). DOI: 10.1136/jech-2023-220576
Offered by
The Metropolis College of New York
Quotation:
Common college meals show a win for youths, households and the planet (2025, September 10)
retrieved 10 September 2025
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