WASHINGTON, Jan. 31,
2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Instacart (Nasdaq: CART), the
leading grocery technology company in North America, and the U.S. Department of
Health and Human Services (HHS), today announced a new
public-private partnership to support and scale food as medicine
interventions, including by increasing access to nutritious food
and offering the tools needed to support better health and
wellbeing for individuals and families across the country.
Through the partnership, Instacart and HHS will seek
opportunities to support food as medicine programs, research,
outreach, and policy priorities that improve health outcomes and
health equity across the United
States. Together, they have committed to engaging and
educating the public on the power of using food as medicine;
advancing understanding of food as medicine intervention techniques
and impacts among key public- and private-sector stakeholders; and
developing new approaches to scale successful food as medicine
programs to reach more individuals and communities.
"HHS and Instacart are working together to accelerate food as
medicine adoption in various health systems and communities. We are
eager to build on this dynamic opportunity and we anticipate
powerful outcomes through collaborative action," said HHS Secretary
Xavier Becerra. "One of our shared
priorities is to engage the public in understanding food is
medicine. We seek to help accelerate interventions, and build
strategies to expand successful programs to more eligible
Americans. The Biden-Harris Administration is using every lever
available to drive new innovations in policy, and deliver durable
solutions that improve our health."
More specifically, the new partnership between Instacart and HHS
— which was announced at the inaugural HHS Food as Medicine Summit
in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday —
focuses on four pillars:
- Advancing and leveraging food as medicine research design and
findings to produce evidence on clinical health outcomes, cost
effectiveness and optimal program design;
- Identifying food as medicine implementation strategies through
policy and public funding frameworks;
- Optimizing communication to educate the public about the value
of food as medicine interventions and resources;
- Ensuring food as medicine interventions support diverse
individuals and communities, with a focus on health equity.
"At Instacart, we believe in the power of food as medicine,
which is why we're building new technologies, advancing research,
and advocating for policies that make it as easy for providers to
prescribe food as it is to prescribe medicine," said Dani Dudeck, Chief Corporate Affairs Officer at
Instacart. "Instacart shares HHS's unwavering commitment to
improving health through the power of food, and we're proud to
launch this public-private partnership with the agency to expand
access to nutritious food and improve health outcomes. Together, we
can ensure the food as medicine movement reaches every family and
community across the country."
The partnership continues to build out the company's Instacart
Health initiative, launched in 2022 at the White House Conference
on Hunger, Nutrition and Health. Through the initiative, Instacart
is leveraging its technology, partnerships, research, and advocacy
to expand access to nutritious food, inspire healthy choices, and
scale food as medicine programs.
As part of that work, the company has developed new technology
and infrastructure to power food as medicine programs, including
produce prescription initiatives and other nutrition interventions.
Instacart Health tools include category-specific food stipends
called Fresh Funds, Virtual Storefronts, and more. Instacart has
partnered with dozens of leading health care providers, insurers,
researchers, and nutrition organizations to deploy these tools for
people with diet-related health conditions as well as study their
impact on health outcomes and health care costs.
For HHS, the partnership is part of its Food is Medicine
initiative, launched in response to a congressionally-funded
initiative in 2023. This congressional action directed the HHS
Secretary, in consultation with other agencies, to design and
implement a federal strategy to reduce nutrition-related chronic
diseases and food insecurity to improve health and racial equity
across the United States. HHS's
approach includes listening to communities and implementation
partners, cultivating partnerships with cross-sector leaders, and
developing resources to support broader action and uptake of food
as medicine programs.
For video of today's announcement and a subsequent panel at the
HHS Food is Medicine Summit featuring HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra and Instacart CCAO Dani Dudeck,
please click here.
About HHS
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) mission
is to enhance the health and well-being of all Americans, by
providing for effective health and human services and by fostering
sound, sustained advances in the sciences underlying medicine,
public health, and social services. HHS administers more than 100
programs across its operating divisions. HHS programs protect the
health of all Americans and provide essential human services,
especially for those who are least able to help themselves.
About Instacart
Instacart, the leading grocery technology company in
North America, works with grocers
and retailers to transform how people shop. The company partners
with more than 1,400 national, regional, and local retail banners
to facilitate online shopping, delivery and pickup services from
more than 80,000 stores across North
America on the Instacart Marketplace. Instacart makes it
possible for millions of people to get the groceries they need from
the retailers they love, and for approximately 600,000 Instacart
shoppers to earn by picking, packing and delivering orders on their
own flexible schedule. The Instacart Platform offers retailers a
suite of enterprise-grade technology products and services to power
their e-commerce experiences, fulfill orders, digitize
brick-and-mortar stores, provide advertising services, and glean
insights. With Instacart Ads, thousands of CPG brands – from
category leaders to emerging brands – partner with the company to
connect directly with consumers online, right at the point of
purchase. With Instacart Health, the company is providing tools to
increase nutrition security, make healthy choices easier for
consumers, and expand the role that food can play in improving
health outcomes.
For more information, visit www.instacart.com/company, and to
start shopping, visit www.instacart.com.
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SOURCE Instacart