Pennsylvania Secretary of Health Announces New, Healthier Food Choices Available Through Women, Infants and Children Nutrition Program

Pennsylvania Secretary of Health Announces New, Healthier Food Choices
Available Through Women, Infants and Children Nutrition Program

Most Significant Change to Pennsylvania's WIC Program in 35 Years

LANCASTER, Pa., Oct. 1 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Health Secretary Everette
James today unveiled the new food packages available to pregnant women, new
mothers, and children under the age of five as part of Pennsylvania's Women,
Infants and Children, or WIC, program.

"The changes to the WIC food packages are significant and will improve the
nutrition of Pennsylvania's new mothers and young children," Secretary James
said during a visit to the Community Action Program in Lancaster. "It is
critically important to give kids a healthy start so they can grow into
healthy adults. Now, WIC participants will have even more choices to support
healthy eating habits."

WIC provides supplemental foods to meet the special nutritional needs of
low-income pregnant, breastfeeding, non-breastfeeding postpartum women,
infants and children up to five years of age who are at nutritional risk.

Some of the changes in the new food packages include:
-- Addition of fruits and vegetables (fresh, frozen, or canned);
-- Addition of soy-based beverage and tofu as milk alternatives;
-- Addition of whole grains (cereals, bread, oats, brown rice and soft
tortillas);
-- Reductions in some food allowances, including milk, eggs and juice;
-- Elimination of infant juice; and

-- Low-fat milk only for children two years and up and all women.

The new choices will help WIC consumers overcome major health and nutrition
risks associated with obesity and diets lacking in fiber and whole grains. The
changes will help parents provide healthier meals for their children that will
also help them to maintain a healthy weight.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC, obese
children and adolescents are at risk for health problems during their youth
and later as adults. For example, obese children and adolescents are more
likely to have risk factors associated with high blood pressure, high
cholesterol, and type 2 diabetes.

The new guidelines will also increase the quantity and quality of food
packages to help support breastfeeding mothers and their infants. The
well-documented benefits of breastfeeding children include a lower risk for
conditions such as ear and respiratory infections, type 2 diabetes and Sudden
Infant Death Syndrome. For mothers, the benefits of breastfeeding include a
decreased risk of breast and ovarian cancers, as well as type 2 diabetes.

The new WIC food packages will be better aligned with the 2005 Dietary
Guidelines for Americans and the infant feeding practice guidelines of the
American Academy of Pediatrics.

The Pennsylvania WIC Program is a federal program operated by the United
States Department of Agriculture, or USDA. On Dec. 6, 2007, USDA published the
final rules revising the WIC food package rules, and charged all state
agencies to have them in place by Oct. 1, 2009.

To learn more about the WIC Program and its new food packages, visit
www.pawic.com or www.health.state.pa.us/familyhealth. Information also is
available by calling, toll-free, 1-800 WIC WINS (1-800-942-9467).

Media contact: Stacy Kriedeman, (717) 787-1783

SOURCE Pennsylvania Department of Health

Stacy Kriedeman, of the Pennsylvania Department of Health, +1-717-787-1783