articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2017/02/01/snap-pushing-for-changes-food-assistance-program.aspx SNAP Decisions: Pushing for Changes in Food Assistance Program By Dr. Mercola About 23 million U.S. households receive benefits from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as the Food Stamp Program, amounting to an average of $253 a month, which can be used to buy "any food or food product for home consumption.”1,2 This $74-billion federal food assistance program is intended to help alleviate hunger among those at or below 130 percent of the federal poverty line,3 but, as with many federal programs, there’s vast room for improvement. While the program has succeeded in fighting hunger, it has largely failed in providing adequate, much less optimal, nutrition. As Neal Barnard, president of the Physicians’ Committee for Responsible Medicine, put it, “The problem is it provides calories, not healthy food.”4Soda Is the No. 1 Purchase Made by SNAP Households The U.S. Depa