Calls for action grow as malnutrition worsens in N/East, N/West

There are growing concerns over the burden of malnutrition, including the severe forms in the northern part of the country. Weekend Trust investigations revealed that many children and their parents are weighed down by the health implications of the burden of the condition as well as its socio-economic and long term effects. The United Nations […]

There are growing concerns over the burden of malnutrition, including the severe forms in the northern part of the country.

Weekend Trust investigations revealed that many children and their parents are weighed down by the health implications of the burden of the condition as well as its socio-economic and long term effects.

The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) on Friday said lack of funding aggravated by President Donald Trump administration’s cuts to foreign aid would hinder the supply of lifesaving food to treat 80, 000 malnourished children in Nigeria within the next two months.

It said 1.3 million children under the age of five suffering from severe acute malnutrition risk losing access to lifesaving support this year in Ethiopia and Nigeria.

• Stop shortchanging Nigerians with palliatives
• Nigeria: Basically everything is corrupted — Onyema Ugochukwu

 

Experts blame inflation, food insecurity, others

Experts and nutrition focal organisations have harped on the need for urgent and holistic measures to address the menace.

They said the persistent malnutrition crisis in northern Nigeria stems from a variety of factors such as inflation, food insecurity, insufficient healthcare infrastructure, ongoing security issues and disease outbreaks compounded by low vaccine coverage.

UNICEF Nigeria  Representative, Cristian Munduate, said nearly 5.4 million under-five children in the North West and North East are suffering from acute malnutrition, with projections indicating an additional one million cases by April 2025.

The UNICEF representative called on government to scale up nutrition interventions and promote child spacing initiatives to tackle the underlying challenge of rapid population growth.

Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said in 2024, its teams treated about 357,000 children suffering from malnutrition in the North.

“This is an increase of 35 per cent compared to the 265,500 children treated in 2023. Among those treated in 2024, 75,000 required inpatient care, while 282,000 received outpatient treatment. In 2024, the surge in malnutrition cases began as early as March, well before the usual peak season in July, and extended through November, a time when cases are typically expected to decline. This situation raises fears that the severity of malnutrition in 2025 could exceed that of previous years,” MSF said in a statement last month.

Its international president, Christos Christou, said the numbers in 2022 and 2023 were already critically high, adding that between January to August 2024, MSF saw a 51% increase in admissions of children with severe malnutrition, compared to the same period the previous year.

He said MSF also treated 52,725 children with severe malnutrition, a life-threatening condition across North in the first eight months of last year.

Speaking after his visit to MSF treatment centres in Maiduguri, Borno State, he said: “Unvaccinated children are particularly vulnerable to vaccine-preventable diseases, which elevate the risk of acute malnutrition.

Also, Save the Children International (SCI) said without an urgent action, an additional one million children in Nigeria would be suffering from acute malnutrition by next month.

Analysis of hunger data from Cadre Harmonisé showed that 5.4 million children are at risk of facing acute malnutrition by April, a 25% increase compared to the 4.4 per cent last year  April

SCI said among them, about 1.8 million could be experiencing Severe Acute Malnutrition (SAM) – the deadliest form of malnutrition that compromises children’s immune systems and turns otherwise treatable illnesses, such as diarrhoea, potentially lethal. This represents an alarming 80% increase in SAM cases, it said.

The group also said the situation is particularly dire in the North West and the North East where ongoing conflict and insecurity are driving displacement and disrupting livelihoods.

Duncan Harvey, Save the Children’s Country Director for Nigeria, said, “In Nigeria, the crisis is reaching unprecedented levels as catastrophic climate disasters, escalating insecurity, and soaring prices threaten to leave over 16 million children hungry. Urgent action is essential to combat this devastating and unacceptable trend of child hunger and malnutrition and ensure a brighter future for Nigeria’s children.”

The organisation quoted Aisha, 27, mother of six, at the Save the Children’s clinic in Damaturu, as saying, “Hunger has entered my daughter’s body and she has emaciated terribly because I am unable to breastfeed her, I don’t produce breast milk. It has affected her growth compared to other children. We are grateful to Save the Children for the support at the centre.”

 

‘I’m worried hunger is hitting children’

Hajara, 15, a child campaigner from Katsina, said, “I am so worried about how food insecurity is hitting children in our community. With banditry everywhere, farmers cannot go to farms so food is getting harder to find. Lots of children go to bed hungry, and malnutrition level is high, leaving us tired and unable to concentrate in school. We need our leaders to step up, bring security back, and help us get the support we need so every child here can grow up safe, well-fed, and healthy.”

Aisha Abdullahi, a school teacher and mother of five in Kano, said she is worried.

“Malnutrition among school-age children is a major risk factor for low school enrolment, high absenteeism, early dropouts, and unsatisfactory classroom performance.

According to her, “I am a mother and I take care of children in school. Malnourished children are more prone to infections and illnesses, which can lead to missed school days and falling behind in their education,” she said.

Governments at all levels must rise to the occasion and address the problem. Children are the future of every society,” she said.

This year, 2025, it is predicted that 33 million people in Nigeria will not know where their next meal will come from including over 16 million children.

Daily Trust reports that hunger has risen sharply in Nigeria in recent years, up from about 7% of the population analysed by the UN in 2020 to 15% currently.

Also, it was gathered that the USAID 90-day funding freeze has affected some malnutrition interventions in the northern states, thereby leaving more children and their families at risk of malnutrition and hunger.

 

Families narrate ordeal

Murjanatu Bello from Gagi District took her daughter who was losing weight after having diarrhoea to Gagi Primary Health Centre, Sokoto State.  The girl was tested and found out to be suffering from severe malnourishment.

“She initially started purging (diarrhoea). We took her to the nearest clinic where she was admitted for some days.

“Some days after we were discharged, we realised, she was losing weight and a woman from the neighbourhood advised that we should bring her to the clinic for a proper check-up.

“We then took her to Gagi clinic, where she was subjected to some tests and later confirmed to be suffering from severe malnourishment,” she narrated.

Another caregiver, Umaima Abu from Bubare village, said: “We spent a lot of money on traditional medicine without any improvement. We then decided to take him (her so) to the primary health centre, Gagi in Sokoto-South Local Government Area.

“He was given some drugs after which the health worker advised us to take him for Tamowa (malnutrition) test which we did. They put something on his hand and later told us our child was malnourished.

“They gave us the supplements free which we have been feeding him with. He is now recuperating.”

Similarly, Kulu Ardor from Lambo village in Kware Local Government Area, who brought her sick child for treatment, said: “He started losing weight; we spent some money treating him because we thought it was a different ailment, until we brought him to the hospital. We were given RUTF in the hospital which we were told was donated by one agency.

“We have been seeing some changes in him since he started taking it.  He is getting well now.”

 

Holistic approach key to ending malnutrition in Borno, Yobe, Adamawa

UNICEF Chief of Borno Field Office, Dr. Tushar Rane, said children in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa states are battling escalating levels of malnutrition and there is need for immediate and holistic response to address it.

Quoting the 2023 lean season Nutrition and Food Security Surveillance (NFSS) Round 13 conducted across the three states, he said the prevalence of global acute malnutrition (GAM) among children under five years in Borno was 10.2%, 8.0% in Yobe and 4.0% in Adamawa.

This also means that an estimated 511, 807 children under five suffer from Severe Acute Malnutrition annually, requiring urgent interventions to save their lives, he said.

He said, “In our states, approximately 2.8 million children under five and pregnant and lactating women (PLWs) are in need of preventative nutrition services.”

‘Number of malnourished children in Kano alarming’

MSF said over 40,000 children were treated for malnutrition in Kano State in 2024.

Weekend Trust gathered that in response to the rising rates of malnutrition, MSF expanded its operations by opening outpatient treatment facilities in Kumbotso and Rijiyar Lemo, in addition to the one in Unguwa Uku.

According to the MSF project coordinator in Kano State, Hemmed Lukonge, “We are dealing with chronic and abnormal surge of severe acute malnutrition, children are coming from around 37 local government areas of Kano State and the state Ministry of Health does not have the necessary means in terms of nutrition supplies and human resources to address the matter.”

MSF advocated the establishment of outpatient feeding centres across all LGAs in Kano to enhance community-based management of malnutrition and reduce severe cases.

Malama Umaima Bello, a mother of one of the malnourished children at Unguwa Uku primary healthcare facility, said being at the facility had accorded her the chance to “understand the difference between food and nutritional food.”

She linked malnutrition, especially in the North, to food insecurity, poverty, poor knowledge of healthy feeding and high prevalence of vaccine preventable childhood illnesses like measles.

It was also gathered that there is an increase in internally displaced people / families in Kano, especially from neighbouring states that are experiencing security challenges among other issues. However, nutrition experts in the state said the main cause of food insecurity could be linked to decrease in agricultural activities due to climate change, high cost of living/ high inflation rate.

Director, Nutrition, Kano State Ministry of Health, Hajiya Rakiya Balarabe, said the state, in collaboration with various local and international agencies, is working to address malnutrition.

 

Bauchi to fight malnutrition with N100m 

Recently, Executive Chairman of Bauchi State Primary Healthcare Development Board, Rilwanu Mohammed, said N100 million had been earmarked for nutrition activities

He said the Nigeria Demographic Health Survey 2023/2024 showed that the state had a high rate of malnourished children.

 

300, 000 children malnourished in Sokoto

About 300, 000 children are malnourished in Sokoto State, according to a UNICEF) report.

A service provider at Gagi PHC, Miqdat Ibrahim, attributed the surge in malnutrition cases to insecurity and poverty.

“Before the current economic and security issues, we were receiving between 70 and 135 cases, but the number increased significantly because of the presence of IDP camp in Gagi,” he said.

 

Zamfara

Also, the UNICEF Country Representative, Christen Muduate, recently said 250,000 out of 1.2 million children in Zamfara were battling malnutrition.

She said one out of every 10 children in the state was staring at death, while stunting among children aged between 0 and five years was at an alarming rate of 45.2 per cent.

“In Zamfara, we are intending to treat 400,000 under five children suffering from Severe Acute Malnutrition. 200,000 additional children in the North-West will require Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) in 2025, compared to 2024,” she said.

 

Implications of malnutrition in children

UNICEF’s Nutrition Officer in Abuja, Nkeiruka Enwelum, said, “Inadequate nutrition has lots of consequences on general health and wellbeing. There is also the implication of increased mortality, especially in children less than three years of age and in women of reproductive age as the main population groups of concern.

“The foods that we eat give us different things in our bodies. Failure to eat some of these things in the right quantities can result in poor growth and development in the body.”

Nemat Hajeebhoy, Chief of Nutrition, UNICEF Nigeria, said investing in malnutrition translates to investing in brain development and the human capital of a country.

“Therefore, it is absolutely vital and critical to our growth. If you have children and you don’t feed them well, they will not be able to grow well,” the official said.

 

How to reduce burden of malnutrition

Save the Children called on governments to tackle food shortages, stabilise rising prices and increase protection for farmers facing violence from armed groups.

“Governments also need to address the climate crisis by building communities’ resilience, as well as more awareness and early warning for people to prepare for climate induced disasters,” the organisation said.

Experts at MSF urged strengthening healthcare facilities to diagnose and treat malnutrition, reinforcing vaccine programmes, enhancing access to nutritious food, improving water and sanitation, and raising awareness.