PART ONE Rethinking WIC

1 Introduction " WIC works, perhaps better than any other government program in existence , " former Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman declared. 1 Former Health and Human Services Secretary Louis Sullivan made a similar claim: " The WIC Program results in significant Medicaid savings that far outweigh the program' s costs by a ratio of 3 to 1.. .. That is clearly an overwhelming return on a small national investment. " 2 Such statements testify to the extraordinary bipartisan support enjoyed by WIC, the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children. Congress established WIC in 1972 as a two-year pilot program partially in response to the 1969 White House Conference on Food, Nutrition , and Health. The conference report concluded that nutritional deficiencies among low-income women and children threatened their health and led to higher medical costs. 3 To avoid preventable physical or medical conditions, WIC seeks to improve the diets and, therefore, the health of low-income pregnant, breastfeeding, and postpartum women as well as their infants and children up to age five. Current WIC regulations, tracking the underlying legislation, describe the " general purpose and scope " of the WIC program as follows: Section 17 of the Child Nutrition Act of 1966, as amended, states in part that the Congress finds that substantial numbers of pregnant , postpartum, and breastfeeding women, infants and young children from families with inadequate income are at special risk with respect to their physical and mental health by reason of inadequate nutrition or health care, or both. The purpose of the Program is to provide supplemental foods and nutrition education through 3 chap1.p65 4 Rethinking WIC payment of cash grants to State agencies which administer the Program through local agencies at no cost to eligible persons. The Program shall serve as an adjunct to good health care during critical times of growth and development, in order to prevent the occurrence of health problems, including drug and other harmful substance abuse, and to improve the health status of these persons. 4 Among the conditions WIC is intended to ameliorate are prematurity and low birthweight among pregnant women and compromised development among infants and children. Peter H. Rossi explained: The main rationale for the WIC program is that significant numbers of poor pregnant and postpartum women, infants, and children have nutritional deficiencies that endanger the proper development of fetuses, infants, or children, leading to …