27 December 2010
Barbara Devaney | Mathematica Policy Research | National Invitational Conference of the Early Childhood Research Collaborative | Minneapolis, Minnesota | December 7, 2007
The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) provides supplemental foods, nutrition education, and social service and health care referrals to low-income pregnant, breastfeeding, and postpartum women, infants, and children up to age 5 who are at nutrition risk. The WIC program is based on the premise that many low-income individuals are at risk of poor nutrition and health outcomes because of insufficient nutrition during the critical growth and development periods of pregnancy, infancy, and early childhood.
The WIC program is a supplemental food and nutrition program to help meet the special needs of low-income women, infants, and children during these periods. WIC provides three main benefits to participants: (1) supplemental foods; (2) nutrition education; and (3) referrals to health care and social service providers.
WIC began as a pilot program in 1972 and was authorized permanently in 1974 (P.L. 94-105). In the intervening 35 years, WIC has become a key component of the nutrition safety net provided for low-income Americans. Today, WIC functions as a vital link in America’s public health efforts to ensure that all of the nation’s children have the resources they need to thrive. More than half of all U.S. infants and a quarter of all U.S. children ages one to five receive WIC benefits.
The WIC program has been the focus of numerous and varied evaluations. In general, these studies show WIC to be effective, although several methodological issues have been raised about the existing research. Most of the evaluation evidence on WIC focuses on the relationship between prenatal WIC participation and birth outcomes. A major methodological issue in these studies is separating the effect of prenatal WIC participation from other factors that are related to both WIC participation and birth outcomes. Despite some controversy over the research evidence on WIC’s effectiveness, the recent Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART) from the Office of Management and Budget rated WIC as “effective”, based on a review of the literature showing positive effects on key health outcomes and efficient use of program funds.1
This paper reviews what we know from the first 35 years of WIC operations and describes the challenges as WIC moves forward. It first reviews the history of the WIC program and provides a detailed description of program eligibility and benefits. The paper then describes major findings from evaluation studies of WIC, focusing on both the study findings and potential limitations of the research. The final sections of the paper focus on future program and research directions for WIC.
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