Food Insecurity, Social Vulnerability, and the Impact of COVID-19 on Population Dependent on Public Assistance / SNAP: A Case Study of South Carolina, USA

I.C. Esobi^1, , M. K. Lasode², C. I Anyanwu², M.O Flores Barriguete³, M. A. Okorie⁴ and D.O Lasode⁵

¹Department of Food, Nutrition and Packaging Science, Clemson University, Clemson, South Carolina, USA

²Department of Geography, Texas State University, San Marcos, Texas, USA

³El Pasoans Fighting Hunger Food Bank, El Paso, Texas, USA

⁴College of Nursing, Chamberlain University, San Antonio, Texas, USA

⁵Africa Regional Centre for Information Science, University of Ibadan, Oyo State, Nigeria

Cite this paper:
I.C. Esobi, M. K. Lasode, C. I Anyanwu, M.O Flores Barriguete, M. A. Okorie and D.O Lasode. Food Insecurity, Social Vulnerability, and the Impact of COVID-19 on Population Dependent on Public Assistance / SNAP: A Case Study of South Carolina, USA. Journal of Food Security. 2021; 9(1):8-18. doi: 10.12691/jfs-9-1-2

Abstract

Apart from clinical and epidemiological factors, a multitude of demographic, social, and economic factors also influence the extent of the coronavirus disease prevalence within a population. Consequently, there is ongoing discourse regarding the socio-economic predictors of COVID-19. This study explores the influence of several demographic and socio-economic variables on COVID-19 cases in all 46 counties of South Carolina, USA as of October 18, 2020. To understand the level of association between the demographic and socio-economic variables with the coronavirus disease outcome, we employed a spatial mapping technique in a geographic information system (GIS) to assess social vulnerabilities of populations dependent on public assistance income and spatially compared the distribution with COVID-19 cases across the 46 counties in South Carolina, USA. We find that dependence on food stamps showed a positive but weak correlation to COVID-19. For individual variables, Age and poverty were strongly associated with dependence on public assistance and were determined to be major predictors of COVID-19. Social vulnerability assessment showed an interesting spatial pattern of counties with high prevalence of COVID-19 cases also having high social vulnerabilities. The results complement knowledge about the COVID-19 pandemic beyond clinical and biological risk factors by assessing socio-economic perspectives and determinants. Findings from this study can inform policy decisions on poverty alleviation, public assistance, and food security programs.

Keywords:
food insecurity COVID-19 social vulnerability SNAP

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

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