Michael Pollan on Health Care Reform

Living on Earth interviewed Michael Pollan this past week (author of The Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food), who argued that health care reform begins with improving what "we put on our plates."

Here is a snippet of the conversation, considering the difficulty faced by people on limited incomes who want to eat healthy food.
Pollan - "You can get 1,250 calories per dollar of chips or cookies but only 250 calories of carrots or broccoli. Um, that is due to the fact that the farm policies we have are favoring the really unhealthy calories. We subsidize corn and soy, which are really the building blocks of fast food. We subsidize feedlot meat, we do a lot to ensure that fast food is cheap. So, I think the personal responsibility argument breaks down pretty quickly and I think you really need to look at the environment in which we're eating and the system that is dictating the choices that we supposedly have."

Listen to this segment on loe.org for September 18, 2009.