ADHS’ Community Garden
It’s always best to lead by example. We’ve been encouraging community gardens for years and now we have one! After much hoping, dreaming and planning the community garden is finally a reality. In October, Jonathan Manning from Elgin Nursery came out to help us break ground. We added compost and cottonseed meal to a long strip that runs along the [...]
Food Cottage Industry Bill
I had the opportunity to talk about the benefits of HB 2103 last week. It’s a real simple bill with the potential to have a big impact. It would basically allow folks to prepare (not potentially hazardous) food in their own home for commercial purposes as long as they package and label it with the ingredients and place it’s made [...]
AHCCCS Coverage Changes?
A few weeks ago I wrote about the portion of the proposed FY 2012 budget that would suspend for 2 years AHCCCS (Medicaid) eligibility for adults without children (called childless adults). As I mentioned in the earlier post, that kind of change would need to be approved by then federal government. Last week, the Secretary of HHS sent the Governor [...]
Whole Grains Campaign
The Arizona Nutrition Network just launched a new campaign targeting Whole Grains. The goal is to educate Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program participants on the importance and benefits of eating plenty of whole grains. Whole grains are great because they give you fiber, B vitamins including folate and they are low in fat, reducing your risk of chronic disease like heart [...]
Diabetes Awareness
More than 10% of Arizonans have diabetes. But what’s even more alarming are the recent estimate by the CDC that about 1.5 million Arizonans (25%) have pre-diabetes, a condition in which blood sugar levels are higher than normal, but not high enough to be considered diabetes. Pre-diabetes significantly raises a person’s risk of Type 2 Diabetes, heart disease and stroke. [...]
Influenza’s Having a Field Week in AZ
The flu vaccine that you and your family got earlier will pay off over the next couple of weeks, it's going gangbusters right now. We monitor several different indicators to determine the level of flu activity in the state and all are on the rise right now including increased school nurse and health care clinic visits for influenza-like illness. We're getting so many [...]