Media Contact:
J. Cory Curtis, Lifelong AIDS Alliance
(206) 957-1630

For Immediate Release
September 7, 2006

Lifelong AIDS Alliance Poised to Alter how Region Views Connection Between Poverty, Nutrition, and Illness
With a $500,000 grant from MAC AIDS Fund, agency will improve the health of thousands and lead regional efforts promoting the role of nutritional therapy in reducing state’s health care costs

Seattle, WA—September 7, 2006—Lifelong AIDS Alliance, the largest HIV/AIDS  service organization in the Pacific Northwest, today announced that the agency received a $500,000 two-year grant from the MAC AIDS Fund. The grant, the biggest in the agency’s 24 year history, will allow Chicken Soup Brigade, Lifelong’s Food Program, to significantly improve the lives of people living with HIV/AIDS in Seattle/King County. The funding will also support data collection that will dramatically change how the region’s leaders view the relationship between poverty, nutrition, and illness.

“Opportunities to have a dramatic impact on our health care system do not come along very often,” said Tina Podlodowski, executive director of Lifelong AIDS Alliance.  “With this investment from MAC AIDS Fund, Lifelong will expand on our investment in proper nutritional therapy as preventative care to reduce the burden placed on the health care system. When people eat well, they feel well, heal quicker, and maintain their health longer. No one should be denied nutritional, healthy, and nourishing food because of their income level or HIV status.”

With the funding, Lifelong will expand food services for their current base of 1,100 food service clients and will add 250 new clients from communities of color and foreign-born populations living in King County.  Given that the increase of new HIV infections are occurring largely in immigrant, African-American, and economically impoverished populations, Lifelong will expand on their meal variations, currently at 17 varieties of preparation, to be even more culturally appropriate.

“The traditional food bank system has proven that you can get food to people who need it, but that food may do little medical good when a person is dealing with a life-challenging illness. If it’s not healthy, or if it’s something that people won’t eat because of dietary, cultural, or religious beliefs, it does little good to aid in the recovery from illness,” said Podlodowski. “Chicken Soup Brigade creates nutritional improvement plans for every client with goals and outcomes included in those plans. We’ve found that proper nutrition is the most cost effective form of preventative care. Far too often people are forced to use the emergency room as their primary medical facility due to lack of access to care and preventative treatment.”

Also with the grant’s support, Lifelong will amass a body of outcomes data to show policy makers, health care providers, and supporters that by investing in proper nutrition, costs and burdens on health care systems will decrease. In addition to applying findings to HIV/AIDS work, Lifelong will also use data to serve diabetes, kidney disease, Multiple Sclerosis, cancer, and other life-challenging illnesses where proper nutrition is essential to healthy recovery.

“The way we eat as a country is becoming a health care crisis,” said Cory Curtis, Lifelong’s director of marketing and development. “We intend to lead the way in reforming how preventing illness and proper nutrition go hand in hand.” 

Lifelong was one of 12 organizations worldwide chosen to receive a one-time $500,000 special grant from MAC AIDS Fund, part of the MAC Cosmetics company based in Toronto, Canada. MAC AIDS Fund announced the grant award at a presentation in New York City on September 6 along with the unveiling of the company’s new Viva Glam spokespeople: Lisa Marie Presley, Debbie Harry, Eve, and Dita von Teese. MAC AIDS Fund is supported 100% by the sale of MAC Viva Glam Lipstick and Lipglass.
 
About Lifelong AIDS Alliance
Lifelong AIDS Alliance provides food, housing and health insurance to people living with HIV/AIDS in King County. Lifelong also provides prevention education and is a leader in local, regional and national advocacy for people living with HIV/AIDS.  Over 85% of Lifelong AIDS Alliance's clients live on less than $15,000 per year.  Lifelong AIDS Alliance is the leading AIDS service organization in the Pacific Northwest and is recognized nationally for its innovative work.

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