The Windsor-Essex Health Unit is urging the province to consider a basic income guarantee to reduce food insecurity in the region.
Studies show that low income families, single parent families and families on social assistance are often choosing between rent and buying healthy food.
Director of Health Promotion Nicole Dupuis says people need to know they will have enough to make ends meet at the end of the month.
"Families or individuals they'll use different strategies in order to make it through the month as it relates to food. That could be skipping meals, maybe even skipping a full day of meals, feeding their children first and going hungry," says Dupuis. Through its healthy food study the Health Unit determined healthy food for a family of four costs around $200. Five years ago the same healthy food basket would have cost a family $166.
