With the malnutrition rate rising in Bauchi, global humanitarian agency Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) or (Doctors Without Borders) has appealed for support to address the growing crisis and warns that without immediate intervention, many lives, particularly those of vulnerable children, are at risk.
MSF within the first six months of this year, admitted about 23,010 children for Severe and Acute Malnutrition (SAM) and Moderate Acute Malnutrition (MAM) treatment in Bauchi.
LEADERSHIP Weekend gathered that the figure was recorded between January and June this year, the highest ever recorded by the organisation in the state, thereby overstretching its capacity to manage malnutrition-related cases in Bauchi and other parts of northern Nigeria.
Since 2022, Doctors without Borders has been responding to malnutrition cases in Bauchi and runs a 250-bed capacity inpatient therapeutic feeding centre in Kafin Madaki General Hospital. In addition, it also runs three ambulatory therapeutic feeding centres in Kafin-Madaki, Kafin-Liman and Miya communities with admissions being received from not only Bauchi but other neighbouring states.
Speaking to journalists in Bauchi, the project coordinator of MSF Bauchi, Mrs Rabi Adamou, said despite the collective efforts, many challenges remained like limited access to healthcare, the number of qualified medical staff in health facilities, provision of medications and ready-to-use therapeutic foods which are critical to malnutrition treatment.
She said to address the problem effectively, the Bauchi and federal governments and international donors must work together to expand the response to avert recording more malnutrition children in the years to come.
Mrs Adamou said in Bauchi, Medecins Sans Frontiers was witnessing an unprecedented surge in admissions for malnutrition and has been rapidly scaling up the response in the area as well as increasing bed capacity at the inpatient therapeutic feeding centre (ITFC), in Ganjuwa local government of the state.
