According to the latest data released by European statistical office Eurostat, an increasing number of Germans did not have enough money to eat meals which included meat, fish, poultry, or a vegetarian equivalent every day in 2022

German corporate newsroom Redaktionsnetzwerk Deutschland released the new data on Monday, which showed there was a 0.9% to 11.4% increase year over year in how many Germans were able to afford proper meals. That works out to almost 10 million people in the most populous nation in the bloc who could not afford to eat properly. Among single parents, the number rose to a even more shocking 19.3%, marking a 2.6% over the previous year.

The opposition Die Linke party had requested the statistics. The leader of the party in the Bundestag (parliament), Dietmar Bartsch, commenting on the data, said there should be a temporary suspension of sales tax on essential food items, and that the state should take control of supermarket pricing.

State media outlet Deutsche Welle quoted Bartsch as saying, “The supermarket has become a rip-off stronghold. The higher the prices, the more people resort to eating noodles with ketchup.”

He said the most vulnerable groups exposed to the problem were children, and he demanded the government create a guaranteed basic child allowance.

Germany, along with many other EU member states, has been struggling with surging inflation which has triggered a cost of living crisis within the nation which has caused consumers to cut back on expenses wherever possible. In June, German inflation was running at 6.4% year over year, well above the ECB’s 2% target rate.