‘We live on Pot Noodles’: Rickets hits homeless families without a kitchen

Homeless children placed in hotels develop rickets and other diet-related health problems because their parents have no place to cook.

The Magpie projectwhich works with homeless mothers in the Newham area of ​​east London, where more households live in temporary accommodation than anywhere else in the country, said families living in hotels were eating an unhealthy diet of takeaways and snacks because they had no cooking facilities or anywhere to store fresh produce.

“We see a lot of malnutrition and tooth decay,” said Gifty Amponsah, leader of the Magpie Project mothers’ rights group. “We also see developmental delays. Instead of good food that meets the nutritional needs of children, they are given medications for stomach problems such as constipation and acid reflux.”

The latest figures for Newham show that there were 114 children in emergency accommodation in October, which could be either a hotel or a B&B. The majority were under nine years old.

Monica Lakhanpaul, a pediatrician at Whittington Health NHS Trust in London, said she sees the health consequences of families living without a kitchen. She treats children who live in hotels and do not eat well due to a lack of varied nutrition or food appropriate to their age, as well as young people who have a full belly but lack essential nutrients.

“We have children with rickets. “Everyone thinks it’s an old Victorian disease, but it’s coming back,” she said. Lakhanpaul, who is also professor of integrated child health care at University College London, investigates the health consequences of families living in temporary accommodation.

She added that poor nutrition can have lifelong consequences for children placed in hotels: “Nutrition is crucial at every step of a child’s life, whether they are still in their mother’s womb or in the womb. first five years of life, when their brains and their bones develop fastest.”

The number of homeless people in England has risen to record levels this year as private rents continued to outpace wage growth and housing benefits, which the chancellor announced will be frozen for another year.

Many homeless families are now being placed in hotels without kitchens as councils struggle to secure enough homes from private landlords, who can now make more money on the open market.

Analysis in October by Citizens UKa civil society alliance, found that the number of children staying in hotels longer than the legal limit of six weeks increased by 663% in three years, from 490 children in 2021 to 3,250 in 2024.

Mia – not her real name – and her five young children were placed in a hotel by Oldham council after she was evicted in May. The family lived on sandwiches and dehydrated meals such as instant noodles during their six-month stay. The hotel didn’t even offer breakfast. “You can’t always afford takeaways, so we had Pot Noodles for lunch and ham and cheese sandwiches for tea,” Mia said.

She also had no refrigerator in the hotel room to store insulin for her four-year-old son, who has diabetes. After living there for five months, he began to lose his sight.

“He stumbled a lot. He had bloody knees all the time. He walked onto the road at traffic lights. I told my health visitor and she took him for an eye test. (His eyesight) was really bad. She chalked it up to being in the hotel room. If you don’t get your diabetes under control, your health will be affected.”

Although there was a communal fridge in the hotel, only staff had access to it. Mia’s son needed insulin with every meal and at bedtime. “I ended up sneaking in a mini fridge,” she said.

The Magpie Project has called on the government to immediately fund councils so they can set up more community kitchens for families to use in homeless hotspots, and install fridges, hobs and microwaves in hotel rooms where possible. In the longer term, the charity would like to see a ban on accommodating families with children under five in hotels.

“This is a national problem,” Amponsah said. “There are many children across the country who go to bed today without home-cooked food. And children are the future of this country.”

Elaine Taylor, deputy leader of Oldham Town Council, said she was aware of Mia’s situation: “Due to safety concerns, every room in the accommodation that previously housed this family does not have a fridge. But the reception is staffed 24 hours a day and there is a refrigerator.”

Taylor added that the hotel was near a church with cooking facilities. She said the family had now moved to accommodation where they could cook.

“Unfortunately, this family’s situation is not unique. We currently have over 700 households living in temporary accommodation because, in common with many other local authorities across the country, demand for housing vastly exceeds supply, and our housing register has thousands of people waiting for suitable accommodation” , she said.

Newham Council said applications for homelessness support have increased by 26% since last year. “This level of demand means we have to use (hotels and B&Bs) more often than we would like,” a spokesperson said.

But the council added that Newham had still managed to reduce the number of families in emergency accommodation.

The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government said it was “completely unacceptable” that appropriate provision was not made for people with health problems. “We have been clear that councils must ensure that temporary accommodation meets household needs and monitor its suitability,” a spokesperson said.

The department said the government had committed a further £233 million in funding to help prevent homelessness and rough sleeping.