A recent assessment1 conducted by the National Environmental Health Association (NEHA) and funded by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has provided a better understanding of NEHA-FDA Retail Flexible Funding Model Grant Program (RFFM) distribution through a social determinants of health (SDOH) lens. The research aimed to identify if RFFM gave state- and local-level jurisdiction sub-awards to communities with evidence of challenges across the SDOH spectrum.
SDOH is a U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) framework, defined as the conditions in the environments where people live that affect a range of health outcomes and risks. SDOH can be grouped into five domains: economic stability, healthcare access and quality, social and community context, education access and quality, and neighborhood and built environment. SDOH analyses can help determine how to allocate resources and plan program interventions to ensure optimized food safety practices, particularly for high-need communities.