At least, 81 children have died out of the about 5, 200 children who were hospitalized as a result of acute malnutrition in Nasarawa State over the last eight months.
Chief Nutrition Officer in the state, Hajiya Halima Yusuf, who revealed this in Lafia during a high-level advocacy dialogue on nutrition, said from August 2020 till date, 5,200 children were affected with acute malnutrition across the 13 local government areas of the state.
She said: “Out of the number of children admitted in various health care centres across the state, 81 of them died while over 2000 have recovered.”
Nasarawa State committee chairman on Food and Nutrition, Mr. Osama Abdul, who is also the Director Planning in the state’s Ministry of Finance, explained that as part of efforts towards addressing cases of malnutrition, multi sectoral action plan with financial implication of over N3bn had been developed for approval by the state governor.
Earlier, the Executive Secretary Civil Society- Scaling up Nutrition in Nigeria CS- SUNN, Mrs. Beatrice Eluaka, described the rate of malnutrition in the state as alarming, saying there was need for the state government to adopt local solutions to address the trend rather than depending on foreign assistance.
