Disparities in access to healthy, affordable food for low-income families With healthy food becoming more and more expensive, it has become increasingly difficult for families low-income people make healthy choices (Ward et al., 2013 ). Low-income families face financial challenges when it comes to making better food choices. Things like housing, utilities, and healthcare are everyday expenses that have fixed costs (Ward et al., 2013). When it comes to food, food prices are flexible as they provide the opportunity to reduce costs (Ward et al., 2013). Families spend limited money purchasing the cheapest and easiest foods they can find, even if it means not choosing the healthiest options (Vergin, 2012). The key to ensuring low socioeconomic families have access to affordable healthy food is not just lowering prices, but creating healthy food and food environments (Story, Kaphingst, Robinson-O'Brien, and Glanz 2008). Low socioeconomic communities need to be designed to help make healthier choices with more stores and restaurants selling healthier options for items families already purchase and offering more fresh, local foods (Vergin, 2012). Furthermore, studies show that determinants of food choice have been limited to characteristics such as socioeconomic position, where the lower the socioeconomic position the less healthy the diets (Ball et al, 2006). The high cost of healthy, nutritious food leaves low-income communities vulnerable to diet-related health complications (Ward et al., 2013). Nutrition is a major modifiable determinant of chronic disease in low-income communities (Vergin, 2012), so it is imperative that programs such as Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Programs (SNAP) help... middle of paper .... ..professional working in healthcare organizations is the United States Department of Agriculture's Choosemyplate.gov website (www.choosemyplate.gov). This website provides practical information to healthcare professionals, the food industry, nutritionists and individuals to help consumers create healthier diets and provide nutrition education with easy-to-use nutritional information. Additionally, one application that can be used to educate and help patients read food labels is the Chemical Cuisine app from the Center for Science in the Public Interest. This application features a list of chemical additives, their descriptions, and their safety ratings to help consumers make healthy decisions. This is an application that can be used by anyone, regardless of their level of education, as it does its job very well in describing what is in the additive and also provides a very clear safety rating.