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Pandemic Provokes Spike in Demand for Food Pantries in US

Associated Press

   FRANKLIN, TENN. - Brooklyn Dotson needed food. Her first unemployment
   check had yet to arrive after she was let go by the warehouse where she
   used to work.

   So the 25-year-old Nashville woman scrounged up some gas money and
   drove 30 miles (48 kilometers) to the GraceWorks Ministries food pantry
   in Franklin. There, at the pantry's new drive-thru, workers wearing
   masks and gloves loaded her van with about $350 worth of groceries.

   "I don't have any income coming in, I don't get any food stamps, so
   it's just hard to get any help right now," Dotson said while waiting in
   line at GraceWorks.

   Food pantries stay busy even in the best of economic times; the
   coronavirus pandemic has prompted a spike in demand as millions of
   people like Dotson find themselves furloughed, laid off or with
   businesses that have suffered huge financial blows.

   "About 50% of the people coming through our lines have never been here
   before," said GraceWorks President and CEO Valencia A. Breckenridge.

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