Stephanie McGaw, a registered nurse with Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center, prepares to take a box of non-persishables ito a person that is coming through the drive-thru screening area of the campus on Thursday, April 16, 2020. The team from the screening area have teamed up with the Central Pennsylvania Food Bank to recognize those who have food insecurities and supply them with needs.
#HungerHeroStories
Penn State Health has been partnering with the Central Pennsylvania Food Bank for more than eight years, offering health education, assessments and immunizations to clients of many of our partner agencies. In 2019, Penn State Health opened a campus food pantry for medical students, and in early 2020, expanded that pantry for employees.
When the pandemic hit in March, Penn State Health immediately began distributing crisis response boxes and partnered with the Food Bank and Caring Cupboard of Palmyra to offer food delivery to COVID positive patients and their families while they were in quarantine. They also offered food boxes to food insecure individuals via their drive-thru testing site. “We wanted to make sure individuals could safely quarantine while they awaited their test results,” said Ashley Visco of Penn State Health.
“As a health system, we want our community to be well,” Ashley continued. “It is impossible for people to be well if they are not able to meet their basic needs. More than 1.4 million Pennsylvanians are food insecure. We would be remiss if we did not partner with the Central Pennsylvania Food Bank to create programming to address these needs.”
We’re proud to name Penn State Health one of our 2020 Hunger Heroes. Click here to learn more about our Health Innovations initiatives.