Food relief allotments—We receive letters from the camps for eastern workers and their large families, beseeching us for food. The quantity and quality of camp rations mentioned therein—the so-called fourth category of rations—is absolutely insufficient to maintain the energies spent in heavy work. 3.5 kg. bread weekly and a thin soup at lunch time, cooked with swedes or other vegetables without any meat or fat, with a meager addition of potatoes now and then, is a hunger ration for a heavy worker.
Sometimes punishment consists of starvation, which is inflicted e.g., for refusal to wear the badge “East”. Such punishment has the result that workers faint at work (Klosterteich Camp, Gruenheim, Saxony). The consequence is complete exhaustion, an ailing state of health, and tuberculosis. The spread of tuberculosis among the Polish factory workers is a result of the deficient food rations meted out in the community camps, because energy spent in the heavy work assigned to them cannot be replaced.
The quantities of bread and [other] food fixed for Polish children in the camps is thoroughly insufficient for building up substance for growing and developing their bodies. In some cases children up to the age of 10 and even more are allotted 200 grams of bread daily, 200 grams of butter or margarine and 250 grams of sugar monthly, and nothing else (factory in Zeititz, near Wurzen, Saxony). * * *
Care of Children—* * * An indication of the awful conditions this may lead to is given by the fact that in the camps for eastern workers (camp for eastern workers “Waldlust”, Post Office Lauf, Pegnitz) there are cases of 8-year-old, weak and undernourished children put to forced labor and perishing from such treatment. * * *
Health Care—The fact that these bad conditions dangerously affect the state of health and the vitality of the workers is proved by many cases of tuberculosis found in very young people returning from the Reich to the General Government unfit for work. Their state of health is usually deteriorated past hope of recovery.
The reason is that a state of exhaustion resulting from overwork and malnutrition is not recognized as a disease condition until the illness manifests itself in high fever and fainting spells.