Malnutrition in England

How is there not more of an outcry about this? Instead, we've got endless coverage about the 'BBC presenter'. It's an absolute disgrace that this is happening in 2023.

Every child in the country gets free school meals up to the end of Year 2. All children from nursery to their fifth birthday get free milk daily. Every child in the country in primary schools receives a piece of free fruit each day. Children who live in low income families are eligible for free school meals throughout their school career, unless their family situation changes and they are no longer a low income family. Add to that food banks where low income families can get free food. Why give children who do not live in a low income family free school meals?
If children are malnourished in Britain today it is unlikely to be because they don’t get free school meals (have you actually seen the quality of school meals provided? I have and it’s pretty dire!) Perhaps City/County Councils not giving licences to more and more junk food outlets such as certain burger or pizza places might help as this type of food contains little nourishment and is available on almost every street corner these days. I’m concerned about the quality of many children’s diet, not the amount of calories they consume.

Malnutrition does not necessarily mean a lack of food - that is starvation. Malnutrition means a diet of food that makes someone ill because it does not meet their nutritional needs and will include people with eating problems like anorexia, many grossly overweight people and a significant number of elderly people have it through self neglect. Not to mention the number of people who become nalnourished in hospital because nobody has time to feed them.

DH lost 3 stone during an 8 week stay in hospital. He was overweight, it did him no harm. But I am still shocked that at no time was this excessive weight loss, 6lbs a week was neber a cause for comment or concern.

I am sure some malnutrition may be the result of inflation, but there are so many other causes of malnutrition.

Statistics don’t give a complete picture. For instance, the highest incidence of children with scurvy are those with autism and developmental delay because of their very restrictive diet.
A high incidence of older people from care homes are admitted to hospital with malnutrition. Not through abuse but because they just don’t want to eat anymore.
As per usual on GN I will put up a disclaimer that any of these diseases caused by neglect or poverty is awful.

With malnutrition is that including drug dependent people? A lot of those people are, so that would definitely skew the figures. They just don't bother to eat proper food, just a sugar hit .

Whitewavemark2 it wold be interesting to see a breakdown of the figures in your OP

I doubt the situations and reasons are simplistic.

There is a high incidence of vitamin D deficiency ( scurvy) in the Asian community.
As in all statistics they need to be looked at deeper otherwise there is a knee jerk reaction as in the OP.

Scurvy is vit C deficiency

Thank you Monica for saying what I was going to say about the definition of malnutrition and starvation which is only the start of the complexities surrounding food and diet. There does seem to be a fair amount of welfare intervention by the state and the charity sector re food but still we have children and adults who do not get enough of the right kind of food (or indeed too much of any kind of food) I cant see that changing despite so many campaigns.
Re Vit D deficiencies in some groups I think that is now well acknowledged and fewer children now present with rickets.
I don't have any answers and now do not work or volunteer in any sector. The only things I can do now is to keep donating to food banks I think.

I echo what others have said in that elderly people will form a large part of the approximately 10,500 adults who are suffering from malnutrition. The elderly often stop wanting to eat and really feel it’s too much effort to cook healthy meals. My own mother was a case in question. She rarely ate very much of any nutritional value after dad died as it felt too much effort for her. She lived at home until she was 93, but luckily after dad died she moved to be near us where we could bring her round for a proper meal several times a week. I’m sure this helped to keep her in relatively good health until her last year, when a fall meant she needed to live in a care home. After this she lost almost total interest in food and just picked at bits and pieces despite the home offering lovely meals three times a day. She lost about three stones in her last couple of years, simply due to not eating enough proper food. Mum was not not poor. It’s just not as simple as saying poverty causes malnutrition.

I don't know the source of the OP's figures but if they are indicating a significant rise in the diseases of malnutrition I would ignore attempts to discredit them.

As stated scurvy is caused by a lack of vitamin C. Vitamin C is found in fresh fruits and vegetables, primarily citrus fruits. Many people don’t eat enough fruit and vegetables and choose instead to eat fast food such as burgers or pizza.

The OPs says the figures come from the NHS. Posters are not attempting in any way to discredit the figures, simply to explain them. It’s not as simple as attributing these figures to poverty. It’s highly likely that poverty is not the reason at all, because the reasons are far more complex. We should not take everything we read at face value.

maddyone

The OPs says the figures come from the NHS. Posters are not attempting in any way to discredit the figures, simply to explain them. It’s not as simple as attributing these figures to poverty. It’s highly likely that poverty is not the reason at all, because the reasons are far more complex. We should not take everything we read at face value.

No-one is saying that it's simple - but there still should be a massive outcry about it in this day and age. Whether it's elderly people struggling to eat in hospital or children not getting a 'proper healthy diet', it's still outrageous that it should be happening in 2023. I understand that some cases can be complex, but we should be still be looking at the different causes and how to tackle them.

Blondiescot

maddyone

The OPs says the figures come from the NHS. Posters are not attempting in any way to discredit the figures, simply to explain them. It’s not as simple as attributing these figures to poverty. It’s highly likely that poverty is not the reason at all, because the reasons are far more complex. We should not take everything we read at face value.

No-one is saying that it's simple - but there still should be a massive outcry about it in this day and age. Whether it's elderly people struggling to eat in hospital or children not getting a 'proper healthy diet', it's still outrageous that it should be happening in 2023. I understand that some cases can be complex, but we should be still be looking at the different causes and how to tackle them.

Agreed, which is why more detail is needed, the cause cannot be tackled unless it is known.

I'm surprised that anyone is surprised.
Until the Government start to tackle the hugely complex issue of Ultra Highly Processed foods which play a huge role in malnutrition, it matters little how much money is poured into the NHS and the population in general will become more and more unwell. Their starting point needs to be WHY is there so much ill health and to work from there.

My paternal grandma got scurvy when she was very old and had dementia. She lost the ability that she'd had all her life to feed herself healthily.

I think this is relatively common in very old people. Once it is detected and care put in place for them, they should recover from scurvy.

maddyone

The OPs says the figures come from the NHS. Posters are not attempting in any way to discredit the figures, simply to explain them. It’s not as simple as attributing these figures to poverty. It’s highly likely that poverty is not the reason at all, because the reasons are far more complex. We should not take everything we read at face value.

I am not stupid, maddyone, I do know something about nutrition and groups likely to be subject to malnutrition.

My point was that, without knowing the significance of these figures one cannot make a judgement. If the incidence of admissions for diseases caused by malnutrition has increased significantly over the last year then there will be a cause which is additional to the usual ones which have been trotted out on here.

The rush to make out that these figures are normal, without context, looks like attempts to discredit the attribution to increased poverty.

maddyonegood point. I believe French children have school lunches provided which offer a balanced and varied diet,
Unfortunately this country has a poor history for healthy food.

Started school in 1957, left in 1969.

I remember the meals, in particular the ones at primary school.

For 5/- a week, one shilling a day, you got a nutritious, well balanced main course and pudding. Cooked mostly from scratch by the dinner ladies. I think they had to follow a government guideline re nutritional balance. Just water to drink at dinner time, remembering the stumpy glasses and rather dented metal jugs.

My DH, at a different school, was eligible for free school meals as he was from a large family. He would be one of those always-hungry little boys, who the dinner ladies made sure were first in line for seconds.

I think the price had gone up by the time I left school, but still good value.

Not everything has changed for the better.

Sorry I haven’t got back since early this morning only we’ve been walking and just returned with a tired dog.

Figures come from HoC library.

So stopping and thinking a bit, we already know that the average height of a U.K. child is lower than children on the continent, and this has been linked to poorer nutrition.

Malnutrition affects 1 in 20 people in the U.K. which is a similar rate to those affected by asthma. It increases to 1 in 10 of people over 65.

In 2020 there was a report published that showed that within the past 6 months malnutrition had doubled - I think it is almost certain that this is getting worse.

Those most at risk in the U.K. are the elderly and children under 5, and of this child wasting is the most deadly form.

I think there is no doubt that the crises in the cost of living is driving these malnutrition figures even higher.

OK. I've found the NHS England figures for admissions with rickets or scurvy. The series starts in 2007/8

In 2007/8 the total admissions for both diseases was 391. The number of admissions rises steadily over the next 14 years to 896 in 2021/22. The provisional figure for year 2022/23 is 800.

This data was issued 11th July 2023. I assume that this is where the OP's information has come from.

To me, this indicates a long term increase in malnutrition covering the period of tory austerity with cuts to public services and to welfare benefits.

The figures for scurvy and rickets fluctuate and don't seem to show any long term trend. Only malnutrition shows a clear cut long term trend.

There may also be demographic changes which affect the figures but there is no breakdown into demographic groups apart from by age.


digital.nhs.uk/supplementary-information/2023/admissions-for-scurvy-rickets-and-malnutrition

I think the malnutrition figures are deeply concerning.

Whoops. should have proof read and edited better.

The figure of 391 rising to 896 was for malnutrition alone, not rickets and scurvy.

Surely there must now be a case for free school meals and midday milk?

Yes!

Every child in the country gets free school meals up to the end of Year 2
Just in England, I think, maddyone.

People can have enough to eat but still be malnourished because the food is poor quality and doesn't contain enough nutrients for health and for children to grow and develop.

Rickets is caused by lack of vitamin D and calcium, both are needed for good bone development but there is such a fear of skin cancer now that children do not receive much Vitamin D from the sun and they do spend less time outdoors too GPs were advised to prescribe Vitamin D to children but this has rarely happened in fact.