SNAP Cuts are Cutting Into Every Determinant of Health
By Mats Delsing, MSc, Consulting Account Manager — November 4, 2025
For the 42 million Americans who depend on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), the program is a lifeline. After freezing the program amid the government shutdown, the federal government has announced that it will pay out only half of the benefits participants would normally receive, with no clear timeline for when the funds will be available.
When federal judge McConnell warned last week that halting SNAP benefits would cause “irreparable harm, if it hasn’t already occurred”, this was not just rhetoric. It marks the need for a humanitarian lens, rather than a political one.
The Human Face of SNAP
Behind every statistic is a household trying to make ends meet. The USDA report on Fiscal Year 2023 gives us insight into the characteristics of “SNAP households”. It states that four in five SNAP households included either a child, an older adult, or a person with a disability. That these families received 83% of all SNAP benefits reminds us that this program primarily supports people who are unable to fully meet their nutritional needs through employment alone.
- 39% of recipients were children, whose growing bodies and minds rely on consistent access to healthy food.
- 20% were older adults, many living on fixed incomes.
- 10% were people with disabilities, for whom food insecurity can exacerbate complex health challenges.
- 73% of SNAP households lived in poverty, living had a gross monthly income at or below 100% of the poverty level.
Hard Choices Beyond Hunger
The impact of a SNAP freeze goes beyond hunger. For these families, the savings that stretching meals and buying cheaper options provide are limited. So, to cover costs, people are forced to make short-term trade-offs that harm long-term health and finances (and even local businesses and economies). Losing SNAP means choosing between food, rent, medicine, and heat.
A parent prioritizes buying groceries, while getting behind on rent.
A senior delays filling a prescription, cutting their pills in half to cover an energy bill.
A caregiver skips a doctor’s appointment to afford fresh produce.
A worker puts a tank of gas on a credit card to get to work and keep their job, despite the interest and debt that will follow.
These choices show the interconnectedness of the social determinants that shape our health, as well as their fragility.
Basic needs like food security, stable housing, access to care, and essential utilities all rise and fall together; undermining one destabilizes the rest. That is why expecting people to thrive and heal while basic needs are unmet is counterproductive and cruelly optimistic.
Necessity, Not Charity
Financial security and health are much easier to break than to build. For many, SNAP is the lifeline that helps families stay on their feet, buy groceries, and make that co-payment while still being able to afford rent. When this lifeline fails, the domino effect can be unstoppable; an “irreparable harm” that destabilizes lives, families, and communities.
A thriving America starts with undisrupted stability of basic needs. The first step is to acknowledge how health and its determinants are fragile and interconnected, then strengthen the systems that help meet basic needs. Once “irreparable harm” sets in, recovery is slower, costlier, and too late for many.
Sources and recommended reading
U.S. Department of Agriculture, Food and Nutrition Service, Evidence, Analysis, and Regulatory Affairs Office, Characteristics of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Households: Fiscal Year 2023, by Mia Monkovic and Ben Ward. Project Officer, Aja Weston. Alexandria, VA, 2025. Available online at: https://www.fns.usda.gov/research/snap/characteristics-fy23.
Author note: Mats Delsing, MSc (he/him) serves as Consultant Account Manager at Advancing Health Equity. He is passionate about translating complex health concepts into clear, actionable insights that promote fairness in healthcare.