Letter to the editor: Organization lauds Collins’ efforts to address senior hunger

For years, Sen. Susan Collins has been a champion for policies that ensure America’s seniors have access to food and nutrition care. As chair of the Senate Aging Committee, she has led important efforts that will help us plan for a future beyond the COVID-19 public health emergency. At a bipartisan hearing she led on how good nutrition promotes healthy aging, Collins noted that food insecurity affects 16 percent of older Americans. She also noted that one in six Maine seniors lives with the threat of hunger and must often choose between buying nutritious food and paying necessary expenses.

Thanks in part to Sen. Collins’ efforts to work across party lines and across chambers, the Supporting Older Americans Act of 2020 passed. This landmark bill added important elements that the senator championed in hearings and statements, notably the inclusion of malnutrition screening, as well as flexibility to transfer funds between congregate and home delivered meal programs, meaning more seniors can be served when demand is high.

To help continue her work to support seniors access to nutrition care and support, Sen. Collins is once again demonstrating the value she places on food and nutrition by working to introduce new legislation, the Medical Nutrition Therapy Act of 2020, that would increase access to medical nutrition therapy for seniors, a critical piece of preventing their vulnerability during future pandemics.

We thank Sen. Collins for her continued efforts to keep seniors nourished and able to live independently and safely.

Kristine Kittridge

president, Maine Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics

Lewiston

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