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What is the Healthy Start Scheme?

The Healthy Start Scheme is a government initiative aimed at helping pregnant women, new mothers, and families with young children to access essential healthy foods and vitamins. It provides those eligible with a Mastercard in which money will be added to the card every 4 weeks to spend on fruit, vegetables, infant formula, and certain types of milk.

Am I eligible?

You can get a Healthy Start card if you are at least 10 weeks pregnant or have a child under four years of age.
Your family must also get at least one of the following:

Income Support
Income-based Jobseeker’s Allowance
Income-related Employment and Support Allowance
Child Tax Credit with a family income of £16,190 or less per year*
Pension Credit
Universal Credit with no earned income or total earned income of £408 or less per month for the family.* (To find this, look at your Universal Credit award notice in the section “your take home pay for this month”).

If you are under 18 and pregnant, you can get a Healthy Start card even if you don’t get any of the above benefits. If you are pregnant you need to contact the Healthy Start team via the details on the how to apply tab below or your benefits agency when your baby has been born. Try to do this as soon as possible to ensure you continue to receive NHS Healthy Start payments after giving birth. (It is recommended to let them know within 12 weeks of your expected due date).

The amount of money that families receive depends on if they are pregnant or how old their children are:

£4.25 each week of your pregnancy from the 10th week*
£8.50 each week for children from birth to 1 year*
£4.25 each week for children between 1 and 4 years*

There is no limit on the amount of children you can claim for.

Fruit and vegetables, these should be:

fresh or frozen or tinned
whole or chopped
packaged or loose
fruit in fruit juice, or fruit or vegetables in water
fresh, dried or tinned pulses

Plain cow’s milk – This should be plain cow’s milk, which is pasteurised, sterilised, long-life or ultra-heat treated (UHT).

For more information on

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Looking For Some Recipe Inspiration?

The Full Time Meals website, Facebook and Instagram have some easy and nutritious recipes that can be made with some ingredients from the healthy start card, and top tips on how to make the most of your food shop.

The NHS Start for Life and the Better Health – healthier families webpages also have healthy and nutritious recipes for little ones that are easy to make and can be made with ingredients bought with the Healthy Start card.

First Steps Nutrition Trust have a resource pack which includes information about healthy eating during pregnancy, portion sizes and recipes which little ones may enjoy. Click HERE to download the pack.

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