A Nutrition officer with Katsina state, Mallam Abdulhadi Abdulkadir on Thursday, revealed that over one million children who are under five years old suffer stunted growth due to malnutrition.

He also revealed that no fewer than 200,000 children were suffering from acute malnutrition in the state.

He declared”Over one million children under 5 in Katsina State are not growing well that is they are stunted. Stunting is one of the chronic forms of malnutrition that cannot be corrected.

“Over 200,000 children are suffering from acute malnutrition.

High maternal mortality rate as a result of iron deficiency anemia are contributing to 20 per cent maternal mortality”.

The Nutrition officer made the disclosure in Katsina at a stakeholders meeting on nutrition, organized by the Aisha Buhari Foundation, Future Assured.

Abdulkadir said women were also not exempted from malnutrition as he revealed that over 12 per cent of women including mothers and children are suffering from malnutrition.

He said the state government established “Community-based Management of Acute Malnutrition (CMAM) “centres in 14 Local Government Areas of the state, as part of efforts at tackling malnutrition in the state.

He added that the CMAM programme, which started in October 2010 with few local governments is currently “covering 70 per cent of Out-Patient Therapeutic Programme (OPTP) in 14 LGAs of the state.”

According to him,33,769 children suffering from Severe Acute Malnutrition (SAM) were enrolled in the CMAM program between January to October 2019.

He declared: “The program only covers 14 local governments out of the 34 LGAs and 361 wards that we have in Katsina State, which is not enough considering the number of children that are having malnutrition and the number of children dying as a result of malnutrition.”

He added that the state government was supporting the 14 SAM Local Government Areas with N250,000 monthly to provide the Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF) in order to curb malnutrition among children in the state.

The Wife of Governor Aminu Masari, Dr. Hadiza, in her remarks at the occasion, said the state government had spent N290 million in 2017 and 2018 to tackle malnutrition.

She also revealed that the government had inaugurated a task force on nutrition in three local government areas of Rimi, Kafur, and Kankia, to tackle malnutrition in the councils.