Today I was researching some material for this blog post and I ran across some interesting data and statistics. I went on to FLHealthCHARTS and noticed a decline in the child food security rate roughly when the Covid-19 pandemic started. This chart shows the data for my County (as well as Florida) but this was concerning, especially since it never fully bounced back to its original state in 2014. I wanted to dig deeper and see how bad food security was as a whole. Due to social distancing and quarantine, lack of workers and raised health concerns caused the food production and production of any goods to suffer. I remember seeing on the news and at the store the insane shortage of goods and how worried others looked including myself and my family. The pandemic disrupted the production and distribution which lead a chain reaction to other big problems. One main problem was unemployment which then leads to poverty and the parents unable to provide enough food for the children and family. The lack of food products also caused the prices to spike heavily. This heavily saddened me; the pandemic was stressful enough, but the addition of not knowing if you’ll be able to afford the next meal or even get one, contributes more to the severity of the problem. In addition, my school provided free breakfast and lunch to the children from lower income families. Since schools went virtual for a while these kids weren’t able to get the extra meals and nutrients. During virtual school and the quarantine, I occasionally thought about those kids and wondered how else will they be able to afford food and get proper nourishment. The pandemic caused unpredictable events and the world still hasn’t fully recovered. I know for my family personally, we had a hard time readjusting once the pandemic ended as well. I hope one day nutritious food becomes widely and easily available to the masses again and this issue gets more attention.  Please make sure to donate to your local food pantry and to always lend a hand to your community whenever possible!