Why malnutrition is on the rise in Katsina
Hadiza Muazu, a mother of 9 children, hails from Kogano village and seeks health services at a Primary Health Centre (PHC) in Daddara town of Jibia LGA. She said, her 9th child was vomitting and stooling profusely and was rushed to the centre for attention.
Hadiza lives with her husband and kids in the two huts they maintain in their village. She admitted that life has been hard and terrible with hardly anything to eat.
Categorically, Hadiza cannot say what her husband does for a living but admitted doing different menial jobs like chopping firewood, bricklaying to sustain the family.
“What we normally have is kunu or koko (pap) in the morning for the children, if we are lucky to have dinner left over we warm it in the morning,” she added.
Asked the food they usually eat, Hadiza said, “tuwo” made from sorghum or maize.
Another mother, Barira from Jema village said, her husband was a Fulani herder.
She said: “We eat as we move, mostly bread which we buy along the road; we hardly have time to prepare meals. We only have a ‘decent meal’ of tuwo when we camp as we travel or when we return to base here.”
Barira sells milk but hardly makes some available to her child.
Another woman Zainab who came in with a set of twins had to be referred to a stabilisation centre in Jibia town because the babies’ condition was critical and required stabilisation first before any other thing would to follow.
Aisha, a widow, said since the death of her husband, life had been difficult. She now fends for her four kids by doing domestic chores for people. Her daughter was recently admitted after she was screened. She said access to food and portable water is a tall dream for her and the kids.
These women were among the 28 newly admitted mothers last week at the Daddara PHC for the treatment of malnourised children.
Most of these mothers are ignorant of why their children are looking so emaciated. They believe that the condition was just natural and with time the children will develop.
Hundreds of children are being fished out daily by Community Volunteers (VC) who are trained to go to the hinterland to look out for such kids and counsel their parents before referring them to a health facility.
A volunteer, Khadija Abubakar, said the living conditions of most of the victims that they come across was alarming. “They live in abject poverty” she added.
Others include poor hygiene, lack of water and proper breast feeding, she added
Though poverty is one of the major causes of malnutrition in the state, ignorance or low educational level on the part of the mothers played a great role in the increasing level of malnutrition across the state.
Other reasons are, inadequate dietary intake and access to food as well as care for children and women; diseases like vomiting and diarrhoea, insufficient health services and unhealthy environment.
It is estimated that in Katsina alone there are about 951,451 malnourished children.
The Executive Chairman of the State Primary HealthCare Development Agency, Dr Ma’awuya Aliyu, said about N1 billion is needed annually by government to address the challenges of malnutrition across its 34 local government areas.
He identified major malnutrition challenges in the state as gaps and high cost of Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) or plumpy nuts, misuse and pilferage as well as high cost of running Community Management of Acute Malnutrition Programme (CMAM).
Despite these issues, he said, the state has developed some sustainable measures to address malnutrition under its immediate and long term measures.
He listed them to include, exclusive breast feeding, strengthening food demonstration, provision of nutrient powder called ‘ Garin Lafiya’ and formation of LGA’s nutrition committees,
Others are, health education to mothers during ANC in facilities, mass deworming and Vitamin A supplementation through biannual Maternal Newborn and Child Health Week campaigns, among others.
A nutrition focal officer in Mai’Adua Local Government, Amina Lawal, said one of the new initiatives embarked upon was to teach and demonstrate healthy food cooking techniques to patients admitted at the CMAM centres. She said most of the women were ignorant of the healthy available foods within their homes and vicinity.
“There are beans, chicken and eggs, palm oil, vegetables, milk and so on in most of our homes and villages, but these women choose to sell rather than to use them for their wards and themselves,” she added.
This malnutrition problem is not peculiar to our rural villages alone, even in the socalled urban centres and well to do families, eating appropriately and balanced diet is needed to live a healthy life, she added.
For Malam Nura Muhammad, the Area Operations Manager, Save the Children, one of the intervening donors in the state, a malnourished child will need at least a carton of RUTF for complete treatment. He said, before the exchange rate shot up, a carton was estimated at about N7,500 but now goes for about N11,000.
He said, each cartoon contains 150 sachets which the child needs to finish, noting that depending on the child’s weight, some are expected to eat three sachets a day while others seven.
“From the foregoing you can see it will take about 21- 50 days to get a child cured,” he said.
On how politicians can key in, Muhammad said, their role is very vital in ensuring the needed enabling environment is created through the provision of adequate legislation and ensuring prompt releases of funds.
He added that they should also create budget lines in all the MDAs to ensure release and utilisation of such funds, and make laws to provide water and health facilities.
Budget for nutrition in Katsina State was only created two years ago. The budget line for the state nutrition for the two years amounts to N350 million.
Though, the budget line was created, subsequent release of funds has been a militating factor to the successful running of the programme.
Development partners like UNICEF and Save the Children International have been raising concern about the non-fulfillment of government’s end of the bargain with regards to nutrition thereby leading to difficulties in executing the programme.
Speaking on the funding gaps, the Special Adviser on Budget, Abdullahi Imam, said funding issues were being sorted out adding that “Already we have the money on ground and treatment and challenges on nutrition issues will be a thing of the past.
“From August till December, we will be making available N150m for the purchase of RUTF, we shall advertise for its procurement or make them available to UNICEF to procure on our behalf,” he added.
“By next budget I assure you the nutrition budget deficiencies will be captured accordingly,” Abdullahi said.
On why he is always seen as the bottle neck to nutrition, Abdullahi said people don’t understand the workings of government and especially regarding finances, adding that there were procedures and they must be followed for proper documentation.