

With electronic WIC cards, program participants will be able to check their benefits balance online and use the card to purchase WIC approved foods for themselves and other participants in their family, such as children and infants. So they have a whole month to use everything that's on that card.”

“They don't have to use all their benefits at one time. “They're going to be able to go into stores, and if they just need to go get a gallon of milk, they can go get that,” Mobely said. She says by the end of October, every WIC participant in Georgia should have the card, giving them more freedom with their benefits.

Mobely is the WIC coordinator for the Coastal Health District based in Savannah, where the state’s eWIC pilot program got its start two weeks ago. “So we now are complete and we're ready to go.” “The state of Georgia couldn't meet that deadline,” Pat Mobely said. In 2020, the USDA issued a nationwide rollout mandate for eWIC to public health departments that didn’t offer it yet. Georgia is one of the last states to roll out the electronic WIC benefits program, or eWIC, which replaces paper vouchers with a debit card. A switch to electronic purchasing will make that even easier. The Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children helps low-income families buy healthy foods.
