Malnutrition: How my daughter came back to life - Nursing mother

The efforts of Non-Governmental Or­ganizations to combat the malnutrition crisis in some selected sites in the North Eastern part of the country is yielding positive results, HASSAN ZAGGI writes.

A 24-year-old nursing moth­er, Mrs Bindo Moham­med, has narrated how her 4 months old daughter, Aisha, lit­erarily died as a result of malnu­trition, but however, came back to life after taking her to the Com­munity Management of Acute Malnutrition (CMAM) site.
The CMAM site is an interven­tion of the United Nations Chil­dren’s Fund (UNICEF) where malnourished children and moth­ers are treated and given food sup­plements and other drugs.
She made the disclosure while responding to questions from The AUTHORITY at the CMAM site in Balle Maternal and Child Health (MCH) Centre, Geidam Local Government Area of Yobe State.
Mrs Bindo explained that her daughter fall ill few days after she was born and became lean, weak and pale and also looked like she would die the next minute.
She explained that every night, it seems as if the little girl will not see the next day and when the day breaks, it’s like she will not reach evening.
“She was like somebody who will die the next minute. She was very weak, the colour of her body changed and cannot play,” she said.
Mrs Bindo who was smiling while responding to questions from our correspondent, said, “I was in the house one day when a woman came to our area and ad­vised me to come to this health facility and they gave me and my daughter drugs and she is fine now and I am also looking good. I am happy this hospital people have helped me and my child.”
Also speaking on the status of the little girl during her first ap­pearance in the CMAM facili­ty, the Midwife in charge of Balle MCH, Esther Jauni, explained that the first day they saw Mrs Bindo and her daughter, they were afraid to touch the girl.

Also speaking on the status of the little girl during her first ap­pearance in the CMAM facili­ty, the Midwife in charge of Balle MCH, Esther Jauni, explained that the first day they saw Mrs Bindo and her daughter, they were afraid to touch the girl.
“The day she entered this place, we were afraid to admit her be­cause she was weak and also very sick. We were even afraid to touch her, but now as you can see your­self, she has improved greatly that you will not think she was ever malnourished. She can now laugh and play and she looks very good. In fact I am very excited.”
The Midwife further explained that the first day Mrs Bindo brought the little girl, her weigh was 3.3kg and “by the next visit after receiving the ready- made food and drugs she was weigh­ing 3.8 kg and now she is 4.5kg.”
Also speaking exclusively with The AUTHORITY, the Nutrition Focal Person of Geidam Local Government Area, Na’ima Us­man, revealed that the nutrition status of children and women in the area have improved con­siderable following the support to both international and local NGOs.
According to her, the nutrition status of the women and children was very poor due to the hard­ship occasioned by displacement as a result of the Boko Haram in­surgency in the area.
“Now immediately after de­livery we tell mothers to start breastfeeding their babies exclu­sively within the first 30 minutes. “We also emphasise the need for complementary feeding togeth­er with breast milk 6 months af­ter. This has changed the condi­tion of children and mothers in the area,” she said.
She, however, applauded the level of cooperation and accep­tance of the intervention by the local communities which, ac­cording to her, has greatly im­proved the living condition of children and mothers in the area.
“The children are now having a lot of interventions. We have about 70% coverage in the area of de-worming and vitamin A. The reason is that because of the level of awareness of the moth­ers, even if the health workers for­get to give them, they come them­selves to remind them that they are now in the 6th month, hence they need vitamin A.
“This is to show you the level of awareness and education the mothers have gotten on the im­portance of these interventions,” she explained.

The AUTHORITY, howev­er, observed in all the CMAM sites visited that there are insuffi­cient health workers in the facil­ities and the accommodations in most sites are not big enough to accommodate the women.
“We don’t have enough space for them to sit down comfortably and because of lack of enough workers, the work is not moving faster. This makes the mothers to stay for many hours before be­ing attended which makes them to apprehensive considering that they come from long distances,” a health worker who does not want her name mentioned said.
She, therefore, call on the gov­ernment to employ more workers to enable the UNICEF open more CMAM sites close to the people who are in the far-to-reach areas of the state.
However, a cross section of mothers interviewed by The AUTHORITY in Balle and oth­er CMAM sites visited applaud­ed UNICEF for the intervention, noting that they have learnt a lot, especially in the area of prepar­ing nutritious foods and exclusive breastfeeding.