Feeding in camp I of Belsen was a major problem. Generous rich food was not tolerated by inmates who had starved for so long. Despite a number of cookhouses and co-ordinating offices, simply handing out food was not enough. Meiklejohn wondered why a mixture that worked so well in Bengal was so disastrous in Belsen. It was, according to the rabbi Reverend Leslie Hardman, "revoltingly sweet". Meiklejohn postulated that the unpopular Bengal mixture, made of dried milk, flour, sugar and molasses which was used in the Bengal famine of 1943 likely halved the death rate from starvation. People in the students' hospital lived due to the work of the students and he commended them for their organisation. The mixture was much too sweet for eastern Europeans.