(Editorial - Graphic Illustration - MetroCreativeConnection)

West Virginia Health Right is on the move. Three mobile units now allow the agency to provide a dental clinic, a medical clinic and now a teaching kitchen to communities in even the most remote corners of the state.

With the most recent addition, the non-profit will be able to travel to parts of 34 counties to provide nutritional education, healthy cooking demonstrations and preventive health outreach such as blood pressure readings, body mass index checks and A1C/blood sugar tests.

“Food is medicine,” said West Virginia Health Right CEO Angie Settle. “It’s not just the prescriptions that a doctor writes you in the office. It’s what you’re putting in your mouth, and we have control over that. Yes, you can do it on a budget. Yes, it can be tasteful.”

Regarding the budgeting part of the equation, it may be helpful for those traveling with the mobile kitchen to include teaching individuals and communities how to plant vegetable and herb gardens, like the one they used to demonstrate the mobile kitchen in front of the Governor’s Mansion.

It is an important mission. In this unhealthiest of states, every support we can give to those trying to do better for themselves and their families is crucial. And sometimes it truly is about learning more.

At community and church events, fairs and festivals throughout the Mountain State, the mobile kitchen’s aim is “promoting good nutrition and supporting a healthier West Virginia — on wheels.” Such an effort could do a lot of good — and lawmakers were right to approve $1 million in funding for the Health Right’s mobile programs.

Perhaps this effort will inspire other groups to find ways to reach the portions of counties Health Right does not serve. Surely it is needed across the state. But in the meantime, it is encouraging to know one little mobile kitchen will be making a big step toward helping West Virginians live healthier.