MALNUTRITION: Soaring Child Malnutrition in Northern Cameroon

Soaring Child Malnutrition in Northern Cameroon, as in much of Africa's western Sahel band, has unusually high child malnutrition this lean season between harvests - high even for an impoverished region where poor nutrition is common and most of the five million people lack access to safe water and sanitation.

Six children died from malnutrition in Kousseri hospital, northern Cameroon, in July alone. Tending to 23 children at the hospital's therapeutic feeding centre, centre director Fanta Abba Adam told IRIN: "We don't generally have this many deaths."

"We are overwhelmed by cases of malnutrition," Mahamat Ousman, a local Health Ministry official told IRIN. He said workers from health centres throughout the district of Kousseri generally come to the main hospital for supplies once a month, but since June many have come four times per month.

"In the 10 health centres in Kousseri city, malnutrition cases [moderate and severe] went from 75 in May to 166 in July," he said.

Even outside the lean season, 55,000 under-five children in Cameroon's North and Far North regions have severe acute malnutrition, according to the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF). That is about 70 percent of the country's severely malnourished under-fives, while the zone is home to one-third of the country's children.

The children who died recently or who are in a fragile state at Kousseri hospital "came to hospital in an advanced state of malnutrition and with medical complications," nutritional centre head Abba told IRIN. "In such cases, it is almost impossible to save them."

In many instances the late arrival in health centres stems from reticence to say a child is malnourished, Abba told IRIN. But access to treatment is also a problem; 20 of the 43 health districts in the North and Far North regions have the trained staff, equipment and means to provide free malnutrition treatment, according to Health Ministry officials, who say setting up treatment in the remaining centres is under way, and the slowness is partly due to a lack of funds.

But one health worker who requested anonymity said part of the reason the structures are lacking is that many government leaders are not aware of the magnitude of Cameroon's malnutrition problem.
http://www.portalangop.co.ao/motix/en_us/noticias/africa/2010/7/34/Soaring-Child-Malnutrition-North,aefb1f6b-bbb6-4031-bc1f-735de47db4b5.html