PepsiCo Foundation to distribute 50 million meals amid coronavirus outbreak

The PepsiCo Foundation announced Thursday the largest grant in its 62-year history — a $45 million program that includes 50 million nutritious meals for at-risk people amid the coronavirus outbreak, distributed by food banks and other partners around the world.

The state of play: Among the recipients are students whose schools are closed. Meals have already been shipped to Alaska, the Bronx, the Chickasaw Nation in Oklahoma, and many other places, a company official told Axios.

PepsiCo Chairman and CEO Ramon Laguarta said in a statement: "Food is at the heart of what PepsiCo does."

• The foundation is also supporting Children’s Health Foundation vans that are providing mobile coronavirus testing in New Rochelle, N.Y., and collecting blood from recently recovered patients whose plasma will be used to boost others' immunity.