Haiti’s child malnutrition has risen amid the pandemic: UNICEF United Nations News

Severe acute malnutrition in children will more than double this year compared to the previous one.

Severe acute malnutrition in children is expected to double this year in Haiti as the country fights the coronavirus pandemic. the peak of violenceand declining resources, according to a report by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).

More than 86,000 children under the age of 5 can be affected, up from 41,000 last year, according to Jean Gough, UNICEF’s director for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Severe acute malnutrition is considered a life-threatening condition. In a somewhat less dangerous category, acute malnutrition in children under the age of 5 in Haiti has risen by 61 percent and is expected to affect 217,000 children this year, up from 134,000 last year.

“I was saddened to see so many children suffering from malnutrition,” Gough said after a week-long visit to Haiti. “Some will not recover unless treatment is received on time.”

Overall, UNICEF says about 4.4 million of Haiti’s over 11 million people do not have enough food, including 1.9 million children.

Gough told The Associated Press during a recent visit to a hospital in the southern city of Les Cayes that UNICEF is only providing a month’s supply of special food for children in need and is seeking $ 3 million by the end of June.

Officials said the pandemic has also disrupted health services, reducing children’s immunization rates from 28 percent to 44 percent, according to the vaccine. The drop has led to an increase in diphtheria cases, as health workers expect a measles outbreak this year.

UNICEF has stated that uninsulated children also die of malnutrition.

‘He never eats’

Lamir Samedi, a nurse who works at a community health center in southern Saint-Jean-de-Luz, said the goal was to include 80% of children in the area, but they have not yet reached 50 percent.

Among the hospitalized children is 11-month-old Denise Joseph, who was quietly in a crib in Les Cayes after being diagnosed with tuberculosis two weeks ago.

“She never eats,” said her grandmother, Marie-Rose Emile, who is caring for the baby because her mother is also ill. Emile strives to feed the baby, saying he has barely picked any beans, corn or potatoes this year.

Gough, a UNICEF official, said he was disappointed with the small amounts of malnutrition and the drop in childhood vaccines. He said more outreach services are needed because the community health center is not being visited by enough people.

Among those who first visited a health center was 27-year-old Franceline Mileon, who brought her young child with a bulhorn in her neighborhood after announcing that a health official had begun a program to vaccinate her. She sat on a bench, hiding her baby, waiting for a nurse to weigh her.

Overall, UNICEF said it needs nearly $ 49 million this year to meet Haiti’s humanitarian needs, adding that it has made a small commitment. The agency would allocate $ 5.2 million of that amount to nutrition and $ 4.9 million to health care, including childhood vaccines.