One in five Brits are eating smaller meal portions, while 17% are consuming food past its use by date, according to a damning official report.
And almost a quarter of adults said they occasionally, hardly ever, or were never able to keep comfortably warm in their living room in the past two weeks, the survey found.
Around one in six adults were somewhat or very worried their food would run out before they had money to buy more, while 6% said their household had already run out and could not afford more.
The worrying findings come from the Office for National Statistics new monthly survey on the impact of the cost-of-living crisis this winter.
More than 2,500 people across Great Britain responded to the questionnaire between November 22 and December 4.
Sarah Coles, senior personal finance analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: "Millions of people face a positively Dickensian Christmas, forced to brave horrible cold and hunger in their own homes, and deal with growing concerns over how they can afford to feed their family."
She added: "More people have been forced simply to turn the heat off and cope with the consequences - and those consequences can be severe - especially for those who are already frail or in poor health."
The survey also looked at health and how pressures on the NHS are affecting people’s lives.
More than a third of all adults reported that cutting back on heating their home has negatively affected their health or well-being.
A fifth of people reported they were waiting for a hospital appointment, test or to start receiving medical treatment through the NHS.
Nearly six in 10 said that the wait had affected their well-being, while just over a third said it has made their condition worse.
It was announced that the NHS backlog has reached a new record high of 7.2million people last week.
Professor Martin McKee, president of the British Medical Association, the doctors' union, said: “‘Dickensian’ might be an overused phrase at this time of year, but we have little other language to conjure up the situation our country’s health is in.
"Food and shelter are the most basic foundations for good health, yet too many lack sufficient nutrition and warmth. With these numbers it looks as if our country is going to keep getting sicker with little prospect of relief in sight.
“The perfect storm of cold weather, eye-watering cost of living crisis and a government that has simply failed in its duty protect the health of the population for too long is now breaking over our heads.
"Ministers must do more to respond to this crisis, ensuring people are able to afford to both eat and heat their homes, to reverse the catastrophic cuts to public services caused by austerity and to invest in policies that protect and improve our health.”
