People have been urged not to turn their fridges off as they face rising costs of energy. Health chief Dame Jenny Harries said that people should also try and keep the heating on “particularly those at the extreme ages of life”.
She said she had heard of people switching their fridges off to save on fuel bills but this “creates the risk of infection in food”. Dame Jenny, the chief executive of the UK Health Security Agency, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “I think one of the important things here is people recognise the importance of spending what will likely be for many people very limited resource on heating, because that is an essential part of their health.
“We’re very aware of this, and I think I’ve heard anecdotally, for example, people turning off fridges – clearly that creates the risk of infection in food. So, it is really important people keep their fridges on and keep their heating on, particularly at the extreme ages of life.”
