Assessing the impact of food insecurity on the nutritional status of Lebanese adults during the economic crisis

Abstract

Objective: The study's aim is to determine the impact of food insecurity on the nutritional status of Lebanese adults during the ongoing economic crisis in 2020-2021. Design: cross-sectional. Setting: random regions from all around Lebanon. Participants: 89 Lebanese adults between the ages of 40 and 60. Methodology: Diets, personal information, economic status, food insecurity status and nutritional status were all collected via a survey on Google forms. The FFQ was used to assess the diets of the participants, it consisted of 28 food items developed by An et al (2018) and adjusted based on the Lebanese diet. Personal information included age, marital status & educational level. Economic status assessment was done by determining the income level and assets of the participants. Food insecurity was assessed using the Household food insecurity access scale (HFIAS) authenticated by Hawalla et al (2015). The HFIAS included nine questions that can assess food security in households globally. Nutritional status was assessed by the NRS-2002 questionnaire that can pinpoint undernourished individuals and individuals at risk of under nutrition, it includes questions about the BMI, and weight loss, in addition it contains a grading system for the severity of diseases as a reflection of increased nutritional requirements (Kondrup et al, 2002). Results: The data was analyzed using SPSS. Approximately one third (38.6%) of the participants had a monthly income between 1 and 3 million LBP they consisted 38.6% and 29.5% of the participants had a monthly income of less than 1000000 LBP. When it comes to food security results were alarming, as the percentage of the participants who worried about food availability was 43.7%, the percentage of the participants who did not have to consume food they disliked was 44.8%, the percentage of the participants of the participants or their family members had to sleep hungry was 33% and the percentage of the participants who couldn’t access food at all for 24 hrs at some point was 19.5%. The NRS-2002 score showed that 29.3% of the participants were moderately malnourished. Conclusion: This study showed that there is a high prevalence of food insecurity and malnutrition among the Lebanese population.