The Sisterhood raises over £200k to stop thousands of children dying of malnutrition in Nepal
The Sisterhood has raised an outstanding amount of money to support Nepal Youth Foundation UK’s project that stops child malnutrition in its tracks.
‘Malnutrition in childhood has many adverse consequences for child survival and long-term well-being. It also has far-reaching consequences for human capital, economic productivity, and national development overall' (USAID). The consequences of malnutrition are a significant concern for the Government of Nepal - 22% of under 5s are stunted and over 7% are wasted. Stunting can cause severe irreversible physical and cognitive damage, and the devastating effects can even impact on the next generation. Wasted children have a high increased risk of death. In addition, nearly half of all deaths in children under 5 in Nepal are attributable to undernutrition (UNICEF 2019).
The huge issue is that caregivers simply do not know how to feed their children a balanced diet. For example, new born babies being fed tea rather than milk and many older children missing out on key meals as parents are too busy working in the fields. These issues are compounded by the fact that families do not know to follow standard hygiene practices such as washing hands and dishes, so children face bouts of dysentery and infection.
Nepal Youth Foundation UK’s programme reduces the level of children suffering with malnutrition with a two pronged approach of educating caregivers (and future caregivers) on how to feed their children whilst also treating those children already suffering with malnutrition. They do this by running Nutritional Outreach Camps in the most hard to reach locations, where caregivers receive training on nutrition and hygiene practices and 500 children per camp are screened and treated for malnutrition whilst receiving a complete medical check-up from a doctor (and are provided with any medicines they require for free.) Whilst mild cases of malnutrition are treated at the camp, severe cases are referred to one of Nepal Youth Foundation’s 17 Nutritional Rehabilitation Homes (located across Nepal) for three weeks’ intensive residential treatment.
It costs approximately £3,500 to run one Nutritional Outreach Camp and £410 to treat one child at our Nutritional Rehabilitation Home (we treat approximately 260 children a year at our flag ship Nutritional Rehabilitation Home in Kathmandu).
To understand more about Nepal Youth Foundation UK’s Nutritional Rehabilitation projects, watch this short film:
