A finds that as many as 450-thousand people do not live in areas where they can easily buy healthy food.
Coined 鈥渇ood deserts,鈥� people in these areas do not live close to supermarkets, making them rely on places like gas stations and convenience stores to get their food.
Cleveland Councilman Terrell Pruitt says food deserts are not only bad for health, but they hurt the community, too.
鈥淎 lot of people won鈥檛 stay. They make the decision to stay in a particular community if there is a burden. Whatever the burden is, it鈥檚 not easy living in the city. But if you increase the burden by not being able to shop locally, not having access to things you鈥檙e looking for, the first opportunity people get, they take off. And that really undermines the fabric of these neighborhoods.鈥�
Pruitt says City Council is currently 鈥渂ending over backwards鈥� to get supermarkets to move into Cleveland鈥檚 low-income neighborhoods, especially on the west side.
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