Pandemic-EBT and grab-and-go school Meals: Costs, reach, and benefits of two approaches to keep children fed during school closures due to COVID-19

Importance: School meals improve nutrition and health for millions of U.S. children. School closures due to the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted children's access to school meals. Two policy approaches were activated to replace missed meals for children from low-income families. The Pandemic Electronic Benefit Transfer (P-EBT) program provided the cash value of missed meals directly to families on debit-like cards to use for making food purchases. The grab-and-go meals program offered prepared meals from school kitchens at community distribution points. The effectiveness of these programs at reaching those who needed them and their costs were unknown. Objective: To determine how many eligible children were reached by P-EBT and grab-and-go meals, how many meals or benefits were received, and how much each program cost to implement. Design: Cross-sectional study, Spring 2020. Setting: National. Participants: All children <19 years old and children age 6-18 eligible to receive free or reduced price meals (FRPM). Exposure(s): Receipt of P-EBT or grab-and-go school meals. Main Outcome(s) and Measure(s): Percentage of children reached by P-EBT and grab-and-go school meals; average benefit received per recipient; and average cost, including implementation costs and time costs to families, per meal distributed. Results: Grab-and-go school meals reached about 10.5 million children (17% of all US children), most of whom were FRPM-eligible students. Among FRPM-eligible students only, grab-and-go meals reached 27%, compared to 89% reached by P-EBT. Among those receiving benefits, the average monthly benefit was larger for grab-and-go school meals ($148) relative to P-EBT ($110). P-EBT had lower costs per meal delivered - $6.51 - compared to $8.20 for grab-and-go school meals. P-EBT had lower public sector implementation costs but higher uncompensated time costs to families (e.g., preparation time for meals) compared to grab-and-go school meals. Conclusions and Relevance: Both programs supported children's access to food when schools were closed and in complementary ways. P-EBT is an efficient and effective policy option to support food access for eligible children when school is out.