Mozambique: Gurué hospital sees dozens of children with acute malnutrition every month

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Mozambique: Gurué hospital sees dozens of children with acute malnutrition every month

8:16 CAT | 04 Jun 2020

Photo: O País

In Mozambique’s Zambézia province, 43% of children under the age of five suffer from chronic malnutrition, a sad paradox considering that the province’s Gurue district is known as the its breadbasket, with the climate and levels of food production both encouraging.

An average of 30 children with acute malnutrition are admitted to Gurué district hospital every month. According to the district’s chief physician, Amiel Gulamo, malnutrition is often associated with other diseases such as malaria, pulmonary tuberculosis and HIV.

“Diseases like tuberculosis and HIV are themselves chronic, and when the patient does not eat a balanced diet, they end up triggering acute malnutrition, and mostly arriving in our district hospital in Gurué,” Gulamo says.

Despite the many non-governmental organizations operating in the area, the numbers of cases remains worrying.

To address the situation, more than 100 elementary multipurpose agents are working in cooperation with partners on health promotion in relation to malnutrition, encompassing nutritional education, distribution of enriched baby food, and the proper use of locally produced food.

“We have also worked with the infrastructure sector to open water boreholes with the necessary quality, because, as you know, if the water is not of the right quality, children get diarrhoea, which leads to even worse levels of malnutrition”.

Gulamo says malnutrition is a multidisciplinary challenge, and results are only to be seen in the longer term. Indeed, the health sector in Zambézia aims to reduce cases of malnutrition in children under five from the current 43 to 40 percent by 2021.

By Jorge Marcos

Source: O País