ADDRESSING THE MENACE OF MALNUTRITION

Government should do more to secure the countryside

The recent launch of a US$516 million appeal to deliver lifesaving aid to 2.5 million people caught in crisis across Borno, Adamawa, and Yobe States by the federal government and humanitarian partners is a step in the right direction. “Humanitarian needs are dramatically worsening at a time when we are facing the steepest decline in international funding,” said Mohamed Malick Fall, the UN Resident and Humanitarian Coordinator in Nigeria. “Every day that funding gaps persist is a day that yet another malnourished child is pushed closer to preventable death.”

The United Nations World Food Programme (UNWFP) has warned repeatedly that millions of Nigerians are at the risk of hunger as prices of foodstuff skyrocket. Since food is needed for survival and well-being, there is a need for urgent intervention to avert a human catastrophe in the country. With the fear of malnutrition for millions of children (and mothers) who are deprived of a healthy and productive life, the situation is already dire. For years, the cost of the general insecurity, particularly in the north, has adversely affected agricultural production and cost of living. Staples such as beans and tomatoes have seen astronomical surge in prices, just like onions, and cassava flour.

Last year, Medicines Sans Frontières (Doctors without Borders), an international NGO, revealed that it had in 2024 recorded a 100 per cent increase in the number of malnourished children with life-threatening complications in the north. While we commend the Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Muhammad Pate, for his quick response, it is important to mobilise all the stakeholders. Besides admitting that the challenge is more pronounced in the north, Pate also confirmed the reality of Nigeria today where “no region is malnutrition-free.”

Pate is right. The challenge may be more pronounced in the north but it is national problem. In its report, MSF had raised the alarm about the urgency of the situation in Nigeria. “Everyone needs to step in to save lives and allow the children of northern Nigeria to grow free from malnutrition and its disastrous long-term, if not fatal, consequences,” according to the MSF Country Representative, Simbia Tirima, who disclosed that because its facilities are full, they are laying patients on mattresses. “We’ve been warning about the worsening malnutrition crisis for the last two years…We can’t keep repeating these catastrophic scenarios year after year. What will it take to make everyone take notice and act?”

The MSF alarm merely confirmed the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) report that Nigeria has the second highest burden of stunted children in the world, with a prevalence of 32 per cent of children under five. According to the report, an estimated two million children in Nigeria suffer from severe acute malnutrition (SAM), but only two out of every ten children affected are currently reached with treatment. Forty per cent of these cases are said to be concentrated in six states. Also, more than six million children are moderately malnourished, and many women, pregnant and lactating, suffer from micronutrient deficiencies.

While urging federal and state governments in Nigeria, donors, and other stakeholders to commit resources and implement measures to avert a potential food and nutrition disaster, the UN warns that timely action is of essence. According to the UNWFP Country Representative, David Stevenson, “the hunger crisis in Nigeria, fuelled by the ongoing conflict in the northeast, needs urgent addressing. Restoring peace in the northeast is critical for us to build pathways to production and achieve the northeast’s potential as the food basket of the country”.

We enjoin President Bola Tinubu to rally authorities at all levels and critical stakeholders to come up with practical solutions to the challenge of food security that is at the heart of malnutrition in Nigeria.