US families struggle following end of pandemic-era food benefits

A woman browses items at a food pantry in Eagle River, Alaska, in April [File: Mark Thiessen/AP Photo]

Los Angeles, California, US – About a year ago, a woman named Ana, who asked that her last name be withheld, gave birth to a baby boy named Israel.

Ana was, as she put it in a recent phone call with Al Jazeera, “making it through hard times”. Living in a shelter in Los Angeles for women who had escaped abusive relationships, she struggled to find a job.