Key House Panel Directs USDA to Consider Funding Multivitamins for Use in WIC Program

A key House Panel directed the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Food Nutrition Services (FNS) to prepare a report assessing the benefits of allowing vitamins to be purchased through the supplemental nutrition program for women, infants and children (WIC).

“Women, infants and children utilizing the WIC program deserve equal access to and should be allowed to purchase vitamins,” said Dan Fabricant, CEO and executive director of NPA (Natural Products Association).  “The Committee’s instructions are a step in the right direction towards addressing the crisis of undernourishment in America.”

Vitamins are proven to have many health benefits especially relevant to those the WIC program intends to help:
· Classic nutrient deficiency diseases (scurvy, pellagra, and iron deficiency anemia);

· Improve appetite and growth rates in low-income children;

· Prevent neural tube birth defects;

· Protect against heart disease and stroke; and

· Build bone mass in the young.

“We will continue to look for policy options to improve access and availability to products that support a healthy lifestyle for American consumers,” Fabricant said.

NPA also sent a letter to the chairman and ranking member of the House Committee on Appropriations expressing its strong view that the WIC program should be expanded to include the purchase of multivitamins and multiminerals.

Read more www.npainfo.org.