The nutrient content of English prison diets in 1944.

The inmates of prisons are restricted to a rigid diet which they are unable to vary or supplement, and upon which they may have to subsist for long periods of time. It is therefore of cardinal importance that the diet scales provided for them should be nutritionally adequate in every respect. There are numerous historical reports of malnutrition occurring in prisons. Between 1939 and 1944 it was found necessary to introduce a number of changes into the diets provided in prisons in England in order to maintain conformity with civilian rations. The present study was consequently planned and executed in 1944 in order to assess the nutritional adequacy of the diets then in force.