Regarding the right to food in the Inter-American Human Rights System, it is established that every person has the right to have their health preserved by sanitary and social measures, related to food, clothing, housing and medical assistance, corresponding to the level that public and community resources allow.

 

A healthy, balanced and varied diet, adjusted to the needs of each person, is a fundamental variable to address the state of health in a society. First, because inadequate nutrition, in caloric and protein terms, is a risk factor, since without a nutritional balance the immune system does not function correctly, increasing the potential for diseases such as diabetes, heart disease, osteoporosis, even cancer. Second, because this sustained condition over time can aggravate deficiency diseases. 

 

On this occasion, the Food Monitor Program (FMP), in collaboration with CUIDO60, focuses on the vulnerability that poor access to a balanced diet entails. It is interesting to review the degrees of vulnerability of people associated with their environment: acquisitive (access), the existence of productive assets available to them (subsistence production), the existence of food transfer policies (assistance), among other factors. We especially review those government policies aimed at ensuring, for defenseless people, sufficient quantities and frequent consumption of food, according to their needs.

 

With regard to health, people in conditions of vulnerability are those who, for different social, health, clinical or personal reasons, have a limited capacity to prevent, resist and overcome an adverse situation that puts their health at risk. In the following interviews, FMP focuses on the differentiated impact on access to the right to food in vulnerable people, who influence, in different ways, their needs and realities. The selected people, from several provinces of the country, correspond to the criteria of medical vulnerability: older than 70 years, younger than 70 years with the presence of some important health condition, pregnant.

 

Note: We clarify that the identities of the people interviewed have been changed according to our data protection policy.