Postcode lottery on hospital food

SOME hospitals ar e spending less than £3 a da y on food for pa tients – while others spend up to £40.

The figureswer e unco vered b y Labour, which is announcing plans for new la ws to ensur e every hospital provides quality food.

Low spenders in the N orth include City H ospitals S underland NHS F oundation Tr ust, which spends £4.85 a da y on pa tients a t Sunderland Eye Infirmary and £5.53 on pa tients a t S underland Ro yal Hospital.

Labour says the “postcode lottery in hospital ca tering” under mines official guidance,which warns th at malnutrition and deh ydration ar e closely linked w ith illness , and r ecommends impr oving n utritional care in acute hospital services.

Shadow H ealth S ecretary J onathan Ashworth, speaking to the Hospital C aterers’ Associa tion ann ual conference in N ewport, w ill announce a new commitment that a Labour go vernment will place hos - pital food standar ds on the same legal basis as school food standards.

He w ill sa y: “When, as a society, we have seen a doubling of admis - sions to hospital for m alnutrition in the last eigh t years , when ther e ar e over 600,000 obesity-r elated hospital admissions and, indeed, when we learn there have been 351 deaths where m alnutrition was a factor then it ’s time we look ag ain at how we deliver food and susten ance to patients in hospital.

“Patient care isn’t just about medicines, bandages , tr eatments and surgical pr ocedures – it ’s about nutrition and hydration as well.

“And yet we have allowed a situation where some hospitals , accor ding to the officialdata,are spending less than £3 a day on patient meals.”