Malnutrition in England

Primary and secondary causes, Casdon.

Primary figures go from 391 to 800 over the same period.

The figures are in the link I posted yesterday. growstuff's link is for an earlier dataset, but gives a more detailed breakdown by age.

Some elderly people just can't be bothered to eat even if they have meals delivered and food in the fridge and cupboards.

Are they admissions with malnutrition as the main cause for admission though, or people admitted for other conditions who are found to be malnourished? I wonder if the pandemic is related in that people let their conditions get worse than they would otherwise have done before seeing a doctor, and took less exercise so became more unfit. Also lot of older and vulnerable people were left to their own devices through this period and were unable to, or were too frightened to shop.

growstuff

Maizie Interestingly, cases of malnutrition haven't doubled for 0-9 year olds (the group which has free school meals), but it has jumped from 102 to 304 for 10-19 year olds.

I was puzzled by the detail you provided on age groups until I realised that the dataset you linked to was published 2 years ago and finishes in 2021, whereas the set I linked to , published this year, with provisional figures for 2023, only breaks the data into under 18y olds and over 18 year olds.

Certainly, the figures for rickets and scurvy vary from year to year and don't show an over all increase in the period. But the figures for malnutrition, as a primary or secondary cause of admission, are startling.

The figures are this:
2007/8.......... 2,702
2022/3......... 10,896

In this period
Under 17s

from 177 -> 312 (which perhaps bears out the effect of FSM, and somewhat negates claims of poor parenting)

18+

from 2.250 -> 10,259

Unknown ages

from 5 -> 325

Bearing in mind that all the issues posters have cited existed at the start of this series in 2007/8, how do we account for the massive increase in adult malnutrition admissions?

I live in an area , which is considered to be relatively posh - a sea of 1930's semis and detached houses with parks and open spaces .

I'm increasingly shocked and appalled at the state of the elderly people , who shop in Iceland on Tuesdays .

First of all , most of them are struggling to physically do their shop .
I watch them juggling with baskets and walking sticks .
And then , having selected items they are often returned to the shelf as too expensive .

I'm only sorry that I can't help them -physically and financially .

Maizie Interestingly, cases of malnutrition haven't doubled for 0-9 year olds (the group which has free school meals), but it has jumped from 102 to 304 for 10-19 year olds.

I think the evidence for universal free school meals is very interesting, I was involved in some training from a school that had run such a pilot scheme, it was fascinating in terms of the impact it had on attainment.
I think to some extent our culture around food is also quite
different to some European countries, particularly around lunch hours etc.

Cases of ricketts in 0-9 year olds have decreased since 2011-12, when there were 724, so I doubt if Covid has had any influence.

Oreo

M0nica

No one is discrediting these figures Maizie but equally we do not want to mount our high horses of outrage and complaint until we know the detail of the figures and their source so that we do not make fools of ourselves by prtotesting agaianst an outrage that is not quite what it says it is.

Agree 👍🏻

So many factors to take into account and junk food is def one of them.Parents who can’t cook so don’t try to, give their kids too many carbs and sugar and little or no veg or fruit.Drug addicts are on the up and they don’t bother much about food.
Mental health can be a reason as well.

The factors you, and other posters, are citing, Oreo were all present in 2008 when my data series (which I linked to) started.

Now explain why hospital admissions for malnutrition have more than doubled since then.

Our grandson will be three in a fortnight, he has not been seen by a health professional since birth.
My daughter was offered a zoom call with a health visitor.
He is a well fed child who is thriving, the house is clean, there is lots of stimulation, good food and no killer dogs in the home.
So many children will drop through the net, this is a fall out from C19.

The most frequent age groups admitted to hospital with malnutrition aren't children or young families, but from 50-89.

digital.nhs.uk/supplementary-information/2021/admissions-for-scurvy-rickets-and-malnutrition-2007-08-to-2020-21

Since a lot of young families have both parents in full time employment, due to economic pressures, there will be time and energy constraints in the preparation of fresh food. Also some cultures are much more food oriented than others.
Some cultures actually cook and share food with the family not living at home. It’s part of social interaction.
I think basic cookery lessons would help. I once met a cookery teacher who was very enthusiastic about her skills and her lessons must have been very valuable in the long term. Also new parents can feel insecure about weaning and good support is needed.

No one gets anything free here- maybe that is the problem. As far as I know they never have, kids bring their own lunches to school, or not.

I wonder whether Covid has contributed to the rise in rickets? Children who were unable to play outside will have missed out on Vitamin D.

I think that all children should get free school meals, which should be well-balanced and nutritious. I didn't stay at school for lunch, other than at a middle school which was too far away to come home, but when I was there they introduced a cafeteria-style system. There was a choice of menu, but you had to choose from different groups - eg if you had the chips you couldn't have stodgy pudding, but you could if you'd opted for salad. By the time my children were at school (when none of the children went home for lunch) they could choose what they wanted to eat with no such restrictions. I'm sure mine would have had chips every day if they were on offer.

Having said that, the 'choice' we had was very limited (eg fish and chips or mince and potatoes) and there was little consideration of 'special diets' such as vegetarianism or to cater for religious requirements. Maybe it would be more difficult these days.

Anyway, I think that if all children got free meals it would be cheaper per head, there would be no stigma and nobody would miss out because their family income was just above the cut-off level. Something like lentil soup and a baked potato with cheese (or vegan filling) would be cheap and nutritious - I'm not suggesting Michelin-approved menus.

All children in Sweden get a free school meal. National efforts to introduce school meals started in the early 1900's. Meals must
be tasty, safe, nutritious, eco-smart, pleasant and integrated as part of the education. Hot meals are served with salad, milk and water and the traditional rye crispbread. Schools have 'proper' restaurants and teachers eat with the children.

There must be a strong link with the 'epidemic' in (often untreated) mental health disorders, surely? Poverty, self neglect, eating disorders and substance abuse run alongside poor mental health:

www.who.int/health-topics/mental-health

NotSpaghetti

1.3?

sorry 1.3 million, I missed out the vital word. Need more coffee.

nanna8, my experience, growing up, was different. We were in an affluent area, had no money worries, all ate a very good and varied diet (and lots of it) - yet, like all the kids in my family, were stick thin from running around all day - and maybe it was genetic.

My aunt took me out to a small museum in an unfamiliar 'rough' area. I noticed a lot of 'big' women around so asked why. She said:

It's because they're poor and always hungry, eating cheap food, bread and lard, chips and buns. Their bodies want good food - so they're hungry all the time.'

I felt so sorry for them!

1.3?

Hansard - 1.3 of people with malnutrition are over 65 according to this report.
hansard.parliament.uk/Lords/2022-12-14/debates/36D3122B-AB3B-498F-837D-0D9EF344901F/HealthMalnutrition
It’s a multi faceted issue.

The Times is reporting this.

Provisional data obtained by the newspaper’s Health Commission under freedom of information laws reveal that cases of malnutrition have more than doubled in a decade and have quadrupled since 2007/8.

From 2022 to April 2023, 10,896 NHS patients — including 312 children — were hospitalised with the condition in England.

Katie59

It’s not lack of available nutrition that is the problem, other issues are causing malnutrition, eating disorders, neglect, homelessness, lack of cooking facilities. Ample calories and protein can be bought cheaply, too many calories is a much greater problem than too few.

This outlines the issue

From the link posted by growstuff

the first graph shows the level of children under 15 growing up in a moderate or severely food insecure household.

The second represents children under 15 growing up in a severely food insecure household.

So those blaming the household - what is different about the U.K. households to those others doing better?

It’s not lack of available nutrition that is the problem, other issues are causing malnutrition, eating disorders, neglect, homelessness, lack of cooking facilities. Ample calories and protein can be bought cheaply, too many calories is a much greater problem than too few.

It is not so visible as it was when we were growing up. I remember some very thin kids with snot hanging from their noses, pale as death but you don’t see that so much now. I think a lot is amongst very elderly persons living in nursing homes. Not necessarily because they aren’t offered food but because of economies they are given unsuitable food which they don’t want and can’t eat.