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A Tragic Love Story

How about starting the weekend with a reading of Romeo and Juliet? Margaret Qualley and David Corenswet star as the ill-fated lovers in the Friday afternoon reading, which will air live on Acting for a Causes YouTube channel at 5 p.m. ET/2 p.m. ET. Brandon Flynn, Skylar Astin, Kathryn Gallagher, Will Hochman, and Samuel H. Levine will join in for the reading, which raises funds to benefit The Entertainment Industry Foundation and Mount Sinai-Chicago COVID-19 Relief Fund.

Sarah Margaret Qualley

Denis Makarenko/Shutterstock

Generation XYZ Changemakers Convene for Virtual 92nd Street Y Summit

The 92nd Street Y is hosting a free virtual summit on May 3 featuring a lineup of speakers from Generations X, Y, and Z on topics spanning politics, wellness, media and entertainment. The lineup includes Cory Booker, Emily Ratajkowski, Ramy Youseff, Jessamyn Stanley, Larry Millsteinand Aoife ODonovan, who will all approach the question of Rebuilding a Better World After COVID-19 through the lens of their respective industries.

U.S. Senator Cory Booker (D-NJ)Michael Brochstein/SOPA Images/Shutterstock

See Benedict Cumberbatch Onstage in Frankenstein

The National Theatre released the latest recorded performance for its At Home series, and this week is a two-for-one. Streaming on YouTube for the next week, take in Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller in playwright Nick Dears adaptation of Mary Shelleys Frankenstein. And there are two versions of the show, both filmed in 2011, to choose from. The first video, released April 30, has Cumberbatch playing the role of the creator and Miller as Victor Frankenstein; in the second performance, released May 1, their roles are swapped.

Benedict Cumberbatch and Jonny Lee Miller alternate the roles of Victor Frankenstein and the Creature.Alastair Muir/Shutterstock

Listen to Jake Gyllenhaal and Tom Sturridge

Let the voices of Jake Gyllenhaal and Tom Sturridge soothe you. The two actors starred in last summers limited Broadway run of paired one-man plays Sea Wall/A Life. While the show closed last fall and Broadway remains closed the audio recording of their performance is now available on Audible, free for members through the end of May.

Gallery Hopping

Galleries are continuing to debut exhibitions thanks to online viewing rooms. Stop by Lvy Gorvy to take in seven drawings by German artist Jutta Koether in the solo show Our Love Is Here to Stay. Galerie Lelon & Co. is exhibiting archival works by Ana Mendieta and Carolee Schneemann in Irrigation Veins, and downtown gallery The Hole is presenting Second Smile, a group exhibition of 35 artists exploring the intersection of the figurative and surreal.

Installation view of Second Smile.Arturo Sanchez

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WWD Weekend Culture Guide: Plays to Watch and Summits to Experience - WWD

FridayMay1,2020at12:01AM

To Mayor Bill Mutz and all the City Commissioners,

I read the recent Ledger article about the road diet project (that began) April 27 and lasts until September of 2020 at a cost to taxpayers of approximately $950,000 and that supposedly this will be a test for one year ["S. Florida Ave. road diet begins Monday," April 26].

I, for one, am trying my best to figure out who you all are trying to fool, and that after the one-year test if it's not working out Florida Avenue will return to four lanes at another cost in the price range of $950,000.

I believe this project/change will go down as one of the worst decisions this City Commission has ever approved. The back-up of traffic for this one-mile section of Florida Avenue will be a tremendous headache.

Ellis Hirsch, Lakeland

Read this article:
Letter: Road diet will be a tremendous headache - Sarasota Herald-Tribune

Dieting is easier said than done. Amid the coronavirus pandemic, it has become more challenging to follow for many of us.

Sticking to a dietary plan on quarantine may seem simple, with planned lunch/dinner dates canceled, less time to go to the grocery store and more time to cook healthy meals at home. However, without a proper structure, you will find it hard to stay on track and avoid unhealthy quarantine snacks over time.

"We establish routines and systems in our lives that allow us to either improve our health or develop bad habits," Emmie Satrazemis, registered dietitian and nutrition director at Trifecta Nutrition, said via Muscle & Fitness. "The second we change that - and this would be a massive change for a lot of people - it gets really hard to restructure those routines and figure out how to basically re-systemize your diet for your benefit."

It is undeniable that precautions to slow the spread of COVID-19 have affected your planned dietary strategies, whether you are new to meal planning or have been aware of your calorie/carbohydrate/fat intake for years. With this in mind, Satrazemis has shared these tips to help you shop, eat and survive while following your dietary plan on home quarantine:

How To Shop

Plan out your groceries before, not after

Rather than stocking up and thinking about it later, it is best to plan things out before your next grocery trip. At the very least, you have a good idea of what perishables and non-perishables you will need for the week.

"You should have some sort of plan for the food that you're buying and how you're going to ration it out for you and everybody in your household throughout the week," Satrazemis said. "Then you don't get into a place where you're either wasting food or eating everything three days after you buy it."

Including everything from meals to snacks in your plan is a good strategy if you find that you are eating everything (healthy or unhealthy) at home just because they are there.

Satrazemis advised doing away with unhealthy quarantine snacks if you are serious about eating healthy during lockdown. At some point, you are going to eat them if they are in your home.

Stock on healthy basics

Though healthy food is hard to find in the supermarket at the moment, there are some that not only are healthy, but also last at least for a while when you do not find it easy to the grocery store.

For your protein needs, canned fish should do the job. Whether it is tuna, salmon or any other fish variety, it won't go bad anytime soon. Other healthy options to add to your pantry include any type of grain (from rice to quinoa), boxed plant-based milks, meat jerky (one that is not full of additives and sugars) and other protein-rich snacks and nut and nut butters.

According to Satrazemis, getting meals and ingredients delivered also helps if you are too scared to go outside and do grocery shopping.

How To Eat

Keep your strategy simple

Satrazemis made it clear that planning out your meals does not have to be perfect.

"It doesn't have to mean that you're hitting a specific calorie and macro goal or weighing your food," she said. "If you're new to the concept, I would say just sit down, write out a weekly calendar, put it on the fridge even and say, 'Heres what I'm planning on eating for dinner throughout the week. Here's what I think sounds good for lunch, here's my breakfast, here's my snacks.'"

Rather than stressing over your dietary plan, use it as a guide on your next visit to the supermarket and try your best to stick to that plan.

Avoid/lessen snacking

Excessive boredom-fueled snacking can be an obstacle even among those who religiously follow planned meal times and regularly go to the gym, and doing something else helps you avoid it. Satrazemis suggested going for a walk outside, reading a book and other activities that do not involve food consumption.

If you find snacking unavoidable, choose low-calorie foods that take time and effort to eat. Some of Sartazemis' top picks include air-popped popcorn; peeled and pitted fruits like mandarin oranges and clementines; and nuts such as peanuts and pistachios that take longer to shell.

"When you actually have to actively open it up with each bite, you think about it a little bit more and you're less likely to eat as much versus something thats unwrapped," she explained.

Protein bars that are mostly healthy are also good choices if you have a sweet tooth.

Choose a diet plan that suits you

Satrazemissuggested smaller changes to get the best results with a new diet strategy. However, if you are set on following trendy dietary plans such as the paleo and keto diets, choose one that makes sense for your food taste.

"We get caught up in wondering what the best option is, when really the best option for you is the one that you're going to enjoy doing," Satrazemis said. "Because if you don't, there's just no way that you're going to stick to it."

How To Survive

Plan out your daily routine

In quarantine, you are stuck at home with the groceries you bought. Over time, this can lead to unhealthy binge eating.

So what should you do to stop that from happening? "Sit down and create a plan for yourself, and then really spend some time establishing routines for your new norm,"Satrazemis suggested. "So things that are as simple as getting up, making the bed, putting on real clothes, establishing actual eating times and getting a little bit of structure into your day."

By creating a specific time for meals, workouts, or taking breaks from telecommuting, you can form new habits and stick to the diet plan you are struggling to follow.

"Habits are everything when it comes to sticking to a healthy diet,"Satrazemis explained. "We can make one choice pretty easily, but to repeatedly make that choice, we really have to set ourselves up with systems and routines to allow us to do that effectively."

Have realistic goals

Having goals in mind is good if you are planning something new, but overthinking about these goals can lead to disappointment.

"A lot of times when we're getting into something new and we're highly motivated, we tend to over-commit to something,"Satrazemis said. She suggested starting simple -- Greek yogurt and apple should suffice as your inter-meal snacks. What is important is that having a great plan is a good start, and making that plan complicated will make it hard for you to follow.

Another thing to be realistic about, Satrazemis pointed out, is your calorie intake. With gyms closed for the time being, it is a good idea to re-evaluate the calories you are consuming and adjust it to reflect on those changes if you have switched from daily lifting workouts to a simple jogging exercise.

Remember the benefits of good nutrition

There is no need to be reminded that a healthy diet will help you feel better, but it is important to remember its benefits whenever your motivation is low.

"Getting good, healthy fats and paying attention to your overall macro balance is actually super beneficial in terms of your mood and energy levels day to day, so you want to have a good balance of protein, fat and carbs," Satrazemis said. "We've all had those days where we've eaten nothing but carbohydrates and we just don't feel that great, and then we've had those days where maybe we didn't eat enough carbohydrates and we feel like we're starving or hungry, or mood is a little bit out of whack as well."

Satrazemis suggested focusing on a balance of macronutrients while not being overly restrictive. These can help you create a plan that you can stick to and feel good about.

Be motivated

Social isolation is difficult for all of us and motivation to eat healthy or exercise is extremely low at the moment. Joining a fitness or diet challenge that comes with a plan may be a good way to feel motivated while stuck at home.

"Doing it on your own is much harder than when you have something to actually follow and inspire you," Satrazemis said. "And you have the plan laid out right there for you. So I would recommend looking for opportunities like that because they definitely exist."

A healthy diet leads to a healthy mind. Photo courtesy of Shutterstock

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How To Shop, Eat And Survive During Coronavirus Outbreak - Medical Daily

The ketogenic diet is one the most famous diets for weight loss. However, embracing a new diet is not always the easiest thing to do. It takes time and effort to get used to the new form of cooking and your new lifestyle. The same is with the keto diet. It comes with small challenges that may hinder your diet. Here are some of the biggest challenges faced by people starting on the keto diet and some easy solutions to them.Tracking carb intakeThe problem: Carb intake can be divided into total and net intake. Total is the account of every single gram of carb consumed and is easier to calculate. Net carbs, on the other hand, is calculated by subtracting fiber and sugar alcohols from the total carbs. These are excluded because the body does not break them into glucose and have no impact on the blood sugar level. However, it is not as easy to calculate net carbs.The solution: The first step is to increase the amount of home cooking. Eating out and excessive snacking can get you off-rack from the allowed number of net carbs per day. Make sure you use recipes with information of everything. The last step is to get yourself a keto tracking app. The more you keep a track of the nutrients in the food you are cooking and eating, you better you can balance the amount of net carb intake per day.

Customizing according to your body type

More:
Here are the solutions to some of the biggest challenges of the keto diet - Times of India

With the novel coronavirus pandemic crippling companies, threatening jobs and denting consumption, the government is trying to shield its economy with a gargantuan stimulus package financed by a supplementary budget bill that cleared the Diet on Thursday.

Although the enactment of the budget bill was delayed due to political wrangling over a cash handout program for households, the 117 trillion size of the economic measures has already been determined.

What are the focuses of the package and how big is this stimulus compared to those drafted in the past? How much will the government spend?

Here are some questions and answers about Japans relief package to counter COVID-19:

How will the stimulus protect the Japanese economy?

One of the top priorities is to stave off the virus spread. The relief package allocates 1.8 trillion for this purpose, to supply more necessary items such as face masks and ventilators to medical workers, bolster PCR testing capability and accelerate the development of vaccines and medicine.

Helping the cash management of companies, as well as safeguarding jobs and peoples lives, are also immediate objectives.

The government will spend 12.8 trillion to fund a controversial 100,000 cash handout program for all individuals, including foreign nationals registered as residents. The Cabinet had initially set a 300,000 cash distribution policy for households struggling with income losses, but it reorganized the bill after Komeito, the junior partner of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party led by Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, strongly urged Abe to do so. It is extremely rare for the Cabinet to reverse a policy already approved.

It will finance 3.8 trillion for small and medium enterprises to secure cash to stay afloat. Also, 2.3 trillion is set aside for those companies and solo proprietors experiencing severe financial losses. The firms can receive up to 2 million each and self-employed individuals 1 million if their revenues have halved due to the impact of the virus.

The money for these measures for households and companies totals 19.4 trillion, which accounts for around 76 percent of the whole supplementary budget.

Dubbed the V-Shaped Recovery Phase, the stimulus package includes measures to be launched once the virus is contained. Japan is aiming to stimulate consumption with its 1.6 trillion Go To campaign, which will subsidize peoples travel expenses and tickets for entertainment events.

But some economists and lawmakers have questioned whether its necessary to prepare such measures now, while the outlook for containing the virus remains uncertain.

Will the Japanese government, which has snowballing debts, actually spend 117 trillion on the stimulus?

No, the government usually uses a total scale figure that combines spending by the central government, local governments and municipalities, the private sector and loans offered by financial institutions.

A large portion of the 117 trillion figure is, in fact, the loan programs. Around 26 trillion in moratoriums on tax payments for affected companies are included as well.

In Japan, politicians and economic experts often use the term fresh water (mamizu) to describe actual government spending or money expected to directly push GDP, to differentiate it from the total size (jigykibo), a measure some criticize as an inflated number.

The Cabinet Office says the amount of central government spending the fresh water is 33.9 trillion. Of that, 25 trillion is backed by the supplementary budget, which will be funded by issuing more bonds and will add a greater financial burden on a country whose debts have exceeded 200 percent of its GDP.

This means that although Abe has touted the total size as nearly 20 percent of Japan's GDP, actual government spending will be about 6 percent.

In that sense, the ratio is close to the U.S. $2.3 trillion (245 trillion) package signed by President Donald Trump in late March.

According to the Committee for a Responsible Budget, about $875 billion is estimated for loans. The rest about $1.4 trillion, which is about 6.6 percent of the U.S. GDP is close to the notion of fresh water, said Hajime Inoue, a researcher watching the U.S. economy at the Japan Research Institute.

How does this stimulus compare to the past record-setting package?

The previous record relief measures were compiled in 2009 when the international community was suffering amid the global financial crisis, triggered by the collapse of the U.S. subprime mortgage market in 2007.

At that time, their total value was 56.8 trillion, with actual government spending of 15.4 trillion, so the COVID-19 package is far bigger.

As for the economic impact, the Cabinet Office expects that the 117 trillion stimulus will push Japans real GDP up by 4.4 percent. Its estimation for the 2009 package was 2 percent.

The scale of the economic measures this time may indeed be larger, but the government will likely have to take additional steps given that it reportedly plans to extend the state of emergency for a month, which will result in more damage to the economy.

Excerpt from:
In Japan's record stimulus, which cleared the Diet, what will be on offer? - The Japan Times

The craving struck me about two weeks ago. My brain's message was clear and direct.

You want Russian dressing.

I tried to shake the thought, but the more I fought it, the more my brain dug in. And then, sure enough, during my next weekly grocery shopping trip, I picked up a bottle to later glop atop a mixed greens salad.

My craving for Russian dressing wasn't an isolated incident. For whatever reason, I picked up a box of S'mores Pop Tarts the other day. I'm still jonesing for salmon roe. Yes, salmon roe.

I'm not alone either. Friends of mine send me pictures of weird chip flavors they've picked up at the grocery store. Another texted yesterday to tell me he ate a Sloppy Joe for breakfast. The hashtag #covidcooking has more than 85,000 photos on Instagram and is splattered with everything from banana cinnamon donuts to Spam mee pok tah.

So what's driving all these weird cravings?

The idea that my body needed some particular type of nutrient within the Russian dressing (the easily digestible carbohydrates in all the high fructose corn syrup, perhaps?), has long been debunked.

New science shows that food cravings operate via a complex and intricate network that involves many parts of the brain.

And there's a big complicating factor about food cravings as it relates to the coronavirus COVID-19, self-quarantine, and the worldwide fear brought about by a pandemic: stress.

To help delve deeper into the psyche of why COVID-cravings seem to be a thing, I contacted Kent Berridge, Ph.D., a James Olds Distinguished University Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at the University of Michigan Department of Psychology.

Berridge's lab studies, among other things, how the brain generates pleasure, controls appetite, and learns reward.

Here's what Berridge had to say about food cravingsRussian-dressing related and otherwise.

"What guides the specific target of our cravingsthat neuroscience does not yet understand very well," says Berridge. "We can say at least that specific food cravings are not random. They're specific to you as an individual, and your history with foods, and your particular likes and dislikes."

In short, one person's Russian dressing is another person's Sloppy Joes.

Berridge continues: "We have a good idea of how brain craving circuitry works to power the intensity of cravings, but not so good an understanding of what controls the specific target of a focused craving, though that's an issue that my lab does now study."

"Yes, definitely. Virtually all stresses trigger what's been called the brain's master stress neurotransmitter, CRF (corticotropin releasing factor) in hypothalamus, amygdala, and nucleus accumbensparts of brain-craving circuitry," Berridge says.

Stress can ignite and inflame. "CRF can directly promote craving itself," says Berridge. Plus, CRF can "also contribute to the unpleasantness of some stressors by acting in other brain structures, and some foods may be eaten more then as 'hedonic self-medication.'"

Anyone who has ever given into a craving for crummy food (S'mores Pop Tarts, as one example) and then suffered some guilt for doing so knows what Berridge is talking about.

"Yes, to the degree home isolation and financial consequences are stressful, that would definitely set the stage for the processes above to kick in and magnify craving," says Berridge.

Most stressful cravings are for highly palatable foods that are also high in calories, says Berridge. (See: sugary dressing, sugary cookies posing as breakfast pastries, sugary Sloppy Joes.)

And so I thought about it some more. While I do remember eating Russian dressing on salads when I was younger, I think that maybe I was actually craving the comfort provided by my yearly summertime Big Mac indulgence. Big Mac sauce sure does tastes a heck of a lot like Russian dressing.

And the comfort food factor, be it from the nostalgia for a Big Mac or Spam-and-noodles, how strong is that when it comes to COVID-cravings?

"That probably has more to do with other psychological cognitive processes and memories having to do with the notion of comfort, rather than basic food-craving circuitry," says Berridge.

So, in a sense, take me back to the Big Mac days.

Excerpt from:
Food Cravings During Coronavirus - COVID-19 and Diet - Men's Health

What is the OMAD Diet? OMAD stands for one meal a day, which is the gist of the diet. The latter is a 23-day eating plan that allows you to eat all you want but in one meal a day. Indeed, you are not limited to eating only low-carb, low-fat, and low-calorie foods. In fact, you are free to eat indulgent foods, such as a pizza, cookies, French fries, etc. The OMAD diet reduces the amount of calories you consume without restricting you in the choice of products.

Benefits of the OMAD Diet

Slows down aging. Eating once a day facilitates autophagy, that is, a detox process, which makes you look fresher. Moreover, it proves to prevent aging-associated diseases, such as Alzheimers and Parkinsons.Facilitates metabolism. When you eat only once a day, your body learns to resist hunger and starts burning fat fast. Furthermore, one meal a day helps in preventing obesity.Reduces your calorie intake. It is impossible to consume the daily calorie intake just in one meal, which naturally makes you eat less calories.

Side Effects

The diet might slow down metabolism. Research shows that if you drastically cut down on your meals, you might start gaining weight very fast.You are likely to consume insufficient nutrients. Since the diet allows you to eat everything, you might choose the foods that are not rich in vitamins and other essential components.You will fail to understand when you are hungry.The cholesterol level in your body might increase.

Conclusion

Although the OMAD diet seems to be an effective way to lose weight fast, there are some serious risks you should consider. Chances are that this diet will harm you. Therefore, you should get screened for the contraindications to the diet plan in question and consult a dietician.

This content is brought to you by betterme.world

Photos provided by betterme.world

See more here:
The OMAD Diet: How Much Food Can You Eat in One Meal? - The Good Men Project

A burger a day keeps depression away? Not exactly, but it might help, according to a new American study.

The University of Alabama report compiled 18 studies and looked at more than 160,000 people. It found that a vegetarian or vegan diet may increase the likelihood of depression.

The U.K.s Daily Mail reported that the study found people eating a plant-based diet were twice as likely to take prescription drugs for mental illness and just about three times more likely to contemplate suicide. It also indicated that 33% of vegetarians suffer from depression or anxiety.

According to the researchers, avoiding meat might be a behavioural marker of people already with increased mental health struggles, though they conceded that would require further study to prove.

They concluded that vegetarians and vegans had significantly higher rates or risk of depression, anxiety and self harm.

The researchers cautioned: Our study does not support avoiding meat consumption for overall psychological health benefits.

The study, Meat and Mental Health: A systematic review of meat abstention and depression, anxiety and related phenomena, was published in the journal Critical Reviews in Food Science and Nutrition.

Read the original here:
Study links vegetarian and veganism diets to increased likelihood of depression - Toronto Sun

After nearly five years of planning, construction will begin Monday on the Highway 14 Road Diet. Construction will begin on the southside of Knoxville near the airport and Weiler Drive and could cause a few delays for commuters entering Knoxville, according to Knoxville City Manager Aaron Adams. Adams says the work south of town will be more extensive as the roadway will be widened as well as a left turn lane installed at Weiler Drive.

Adams says the construction south of town should also take longer than the rest of the work throughout Knoxville. Highway 14 will be reduced to three lanes starting at the south side of Knoxville and will feature one southbound lane, one northbound lane and a middle turn lane as well as wider shoulders. The road diet is expected to improve the flow of traffic on Highway 14 through Knoxville. Adams says the construction should last through the majority of the summer with the contractors having 140 working days to complete the project.To hear the complete interview with Adams, tune in todays Lets Talk Knoxville.

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Construction to Begin Monday on Highway 14 Road Diet - KNIA / KRLS Radio

The coronavirus pandemic has changed a lot about modern American life: how we work, socialize, and even how we eat. Dining out is a distant memory.

But nutritionally, people werent exactly thriving in pre-pandemic America. Before COVID-19 came along, it was increasingly clear that the diet quality and nutritional status of Americans was terrible, says Dr. Walter Willett, professor of epidemiology and nutrition at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. More than 40% of U.S. adults are obese. After years of declines, heart disease death rates are on the rise again. So are rates of obesity-linked cancers among younger people. Poor diets are the number-one cause of poor health in the U.S., according to a 2018 study published in JAMA.

Now that Americans are eating most meals at home, might our diets actually improve?

Researchers are just beginning to study how people are feeding themselves during the pandemic, and while there is no robust data yet, the shifts are obvious. People are eating almost every meal at home, which is a huge change, says Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian, a cardiologist and dean of the Tufts Friedman School of Nutrition Science. By necessity, Americans are cooking more; web traffic to cooking and recipe websites is surging. In an April survey of about 1,000 American adults, by the food and beverage communications firm HUNTER, about half said they were cooking and baking more now than before the pandemic, and 38% were ordering less takeout and delivery.

Its possible that a shift toward home cooking, if it persists, could eventually lead to reductions in chronic diet-related illnesses, like cardiovascular disease, diabetes, hypertension and obesity. Eating a healthy diet is linked to a longer life, and one of the biggest predictors of eating a healthy diet is eating at home, Mozaffarian says. His new research published in April in the Journal of Nutrition found that Americans get about 21% of their calories from restaurantsand most of that food is of poor nutritional quality. Restaurant foods tend to be fairly unhealthy, he says; theres a lot of variation depending on the restaurant and what you order, but typical menu offerings at large chains, for example, are high in sodium, calories, saturated fat and sugar. Cooking puts you in control of the ingredients that end up in your meal.

But he and other experts emphasize that on a population level, any long-term improvements caused by increased cooking are likely to be small compared to the bad health effects of this crisis. Besides the devastating toll of the coronavirus itself, stay-at-home orders limit physical activity, social isolation likely increases loneliness (which is linked to heart attacks and stroke) and job loss destroys peoples access to health care.

Unhealthy foods are also still in wide circulation. Flour, sugar, canned soups and alcoholnot exactly staples of a wholesome diethave all surged in U.S. sales during the pandemic. Health officials are urging Americans to go grocery shopping as infrequently as possible, boosting the appeal of highly processed foods, which last longer than fresh but are loaded with sugar, fat and salt and linked to a higher risk of cancer . The stress of the pandemic may also make people want to bake batches of cookies and load up on processed snacks, since foods like these can comfort people in scary times.

Keep up to date on the growing threat to global health by signing up for our daily coronavirus newsletter.

Just because a meal is cooked at home does not mean its healthyand not everyone has the same opportunity to prepare meals with healthy ingredients, says Julia Wolfson, an assistant professor of health management and policy at the University of Michigan School of Public Health. Wolfson is conducting a national survey of low-income adults to find out how the coronavirus pandemic is affecting their eating behaviors and food choices. It matters if you have access to fresh vegetables and fruit, or if you have the income to buy perishable foods that are less processed and less energy-dense than a lot of the more shelf-stable, highly processed foods. Her past research has found that the relationship between cooking more frequently and having a better diet only holds true for higher income households.

She and others expect the pandemic to widen the nutritional disparities between wealthier and working-class Americans. More than 26 million people have filed for unemployment since mid-March, and there is now unmeetable demand at food banks and a spate of sign-ups for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits, which arent always sufficient or easy to obtain even in the best of times. For people who are able to work from home and have kept their jobs and have a stable source of incomeand who are now not eating out as much as they were before and cooking at home morewe are going to see this relationship with better diet quality, Wolfson predicts. But for others who have lost their jobs or who live in neighborhoods where produce isnt well stocked or grocery delivery isnt offered, they might be relying even more than usual on some of these more highly processed foods that are very shelf-stable and affordable, but not very good for you. That also creates an opening for fast-food restaurants that are offering a lot of deals right now to fill that gap for people.

It is more expensive to feed a family in this context, says Sinikka Elliott, associate professor of sociology at the University of British Columbia and co-author of Pressure Cooker: Why Home Cooking Wont Solve Our Problems and What We Can Do About It. With kids out of school and daycare, families can no longer depend on lunch or breakfast being covered for their children. And for shoppers on a budget, its not just annoying to substitute out-of-stock ingredients at the supermarket; its costly. You cant shop for sales the way you used to, Elliott says. All of these things make it difficult for families who were already struggling before this. While the pandemic gives many people more time at homea lack of which is one of the major reasons why people say they dont cook morethat, too, is uneven. For essential workers or people taking care of children, extra time for shopping and cooking may not exist.

So much variability makes it difficult to predict how the coronavirus pandemic will change how Americans eat, or if these changes will be permanent. But one thing is becoming clear: The epidemic is likely affecting diets, and our diets are likely affecting who dies, says Willett. He is now studying how peoples diets are linked to their outcomes if they get infected with the coronavirus. Research is finding that major risk factors for being hospitalized for COVID-19 include diet-related conditions, like obesity, hypertension and Type 2 diabetes. If we had a metabolically healthy population, the risk of hospitalization from COVID could be dramatically lower, Mozaffarian says.

Poor metabolic health is devastating for resilience of the population, he adds. We need a healthier food system through better policy, not just the random chance disaster of restaurants being closed.

Please send tips, leads, and stories from the frontlines to virus@time.com.

Thank you! For your security, we've sent a confirmation email to the address you entered. Click the link to confirm your subscription and begin receiving our newsletters. If you don't get the confirmation within 10 minutes, please check your spam folder.

Write to Mandy Oaklander at mandy.oaklander@time.com.

Continued here:
Our Diets Are Changing Because of the Coronavirus Pandemic. Is It for the Better? - TIME

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