Cook County Illinois WIC Services In Jeopardy? : video & report : May 26 2011 CBS2

CHICAGO (CBS2) — The Women, Infants and Children program, or WIC, is in big trouble here in Cook County.

For the first time more than 20 years, Cook County may be opting out of the federally funded program.

As CBS 2’s Mike Puccinelli reports, advocates of that program fear that many women and children will suffer.


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Lewis says the WIC program also taught her the importance of eating right.

“I was the type of person who didn’t eat a vegetable. Now I eat every vegetable there is in the world,” she said.

And more importantly, she instilled those nutritional habits in her children.

Ambar Sosa says WIC has helped her supply her son, Giancarlo, with good nutrition ever since he was born four years ago.

“They give me milk, they gave me beans, they gave me juice, they gave me a lot of stuff that I really need,” Sosa said.

But now the Cicero WIC office where Sosa gets the services is slated to close. It’s one of 11 offices run by Cook County that will be affected if Cook County ends its affiliation with the federally funded program by the end of June.

Health Advocate Jacquelin Johnson says women and young children under the age of five will be the ones paying the price if the county no longer takes the $3 million dollars in WIC funds being offered by the federal government.

She says it will put lives at risk.

Union jobs will also be lost if the plan goes through. Anne Irving, policy director at the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees Council 31, says 50 people will be laid off.

“I think the real tragedy here is the impact on the families that rely on these services,” she said. “If we have fewer families seeking services … that will have an impact.”

City WIC offices will not be affected. The Cook County Department of Public Health declined an interview request. The agency released a statement saying the Illinois Department of Human Services administers WIC, and the program will continue to be provided to their clients without interruption.

In all, about 23,000 women and children are served by the county’s WIC sites