Programs

WORLD HUNGER STATS

• Hunger remains the No.1 cause of death in the world.
• Every six seconds a child dies because of hunger and related causes (16,000/day).
• 923 million people across the world are hungry.
• Every 3.6 seconds someone dies of hunger (24,000/day).
• 1.02 billion people do not have enough to eat

The tragedy about hunger is that there is enough food in the world to feed everyone 2700 calories per day!

usa programs

ONE IN SIX AMERICANS LIVE IN POVERTY

By Hope Yen, Associated Press Writer
On 8:49 am EDT, Tuesday October 20, 2009

WASHINGTON (AP) — The level of poverty in America is even worse than first believed. A revised formula for calculating medical costs and geographic variations show that approximately 47.4 million Americans last year lived in poverty, 7 million more than the government’s official figure.

The disparity occurs because of differing formulas the Census Bureau and the National Academy of Science use for calculating the poverty rate. The NAS formula shows the poverty rate to be at 15.8 percent, or nearly 1 in 6 Americans, according to calculations released this week. That’s higher than the 13.2 percent, or 39.8 million, figure made available recently under the original government formula.

That measure, created in 1955, does not factor in rising medical care, transportation, child care or geographical variations in living costs. Nor does it consider non-cash government aid when calculating income. As a result, official figures released last month by Census may have overlooked millions of poor people, many of them 65 and older.