WellStar Employees Volunteer To Improve Food Insecurity

ROSWELL, GA — Every three years, WellStar Health System – in partnership with the Georgia Health Policy Center – conducts a Community Health Needs Assessment. Key findings from the 2019 assessment revealed high food insecurity and low access to grocery stores in many of the communities WellStar serves.

On June 25, more than 400 WellStar employees volunteered their time to improve access to healthy foods across the region.

Food insecurity is a growing problem in Greater Atlanta and around the country. According to data from Feeding America's Map the Meal Gap study, more than 1,501,680 people are struggling with hunger in Georgia – and 503,370 of them are children. In fact, 1 in 7 people in our communities don’t have enough food to eat.

To help fight hunger, WellStar partnered with the Atlanta Community Food Bank and other local agencies to launch the inaugural WellStar Day of Service. Events ran from 7 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. All month, WellStar employees have been donating healthy food items to local agencies.

Community service activities included a pop-up fresh food market at the West End MARTA station, a mobile food pantry at Collins Memorial UMC and a summer lunch packing station at MUST Ministries. At the Atlanta Community Food Bank, over 26,000 pounds of food was salvaged which resulted in providing 17,235 meals. At MUST Ministries, 5,616 lunches were packed for children served by the MUST Summer Lunch Program.

This was a WellStar Health System initiative so employees from across the network volunteered their time.

Service sites were spread across Atlanta, Austell, Dallas, Griffin, LaGrange, Marietta and Roswell. In addition to the Atlanta Community Food Bank, WellStar worked with Feeding the Valley, Sweet Water Mission, MUST Ministries, Helping Hands Paulding and 5 Loaves & 2 Fish.