Holystic Nutrition, a non-governmental organisation headquartered in Obuasi which is basically into sustainable nutrition for productive life, has provided assistance to 51 children with acute malnutrition. The children who were selected from 215 other children through a screening exercise organised two months ago, received Ready-to-use therapeutic feed (RETF), fortified supplementary food and medication costing an average of GHc200 per child over the two months period.
The unveiling of the success of the treatment to the Sansu community which took place at the Sansu Roman Catholic church had support and presence from the Ghana Health Service, the Sansu Church Council and the traditional council with the Adontenhene of the community, Atta Yaw chairing the function.
32 of the 51 malnourished children were moderately malnourished and the remaining 19 severely malnourished. 33 of the malnourished children were successfully discharged from the program on the day of the unveiling durbar.
Speaking to the Executive Director of Holystic Nutrition, a graduate nurse with post graduate speciality in Nutrition and Dietetic, David Ameyaw, he revealed the purpose for the grand durbar:
“This event is aimed at educating and conscientizing mothers on the benefits of weighing and its role in the prevention and early detection of malnutrition”, he said.
Malnutrition among children under 5 years costs the government of Ghana 6.4% of our GDP (GH4.6 Billion annually according to the 2016 Cost of Hunger Africa report for Ghana.
Holystic Nutrition took the opportunity to form the Mother s’ Support Group. The group will meet monthly to have some health information sessions and also empowerment sessions in which the mothers will be empowered socio-economically through skill training and entrepreneurship sessions so that they can achieve household nutrition security. It is the belief of Holistic Nutrition that, once the mothers know the appropriate child care practices and are empowered socio-economically, the child malnutrition can be eradicated. The initiative known as Save the Malnourished Child (SMALCHILD) project has started at the Sansu community and the organisers wish to extend the initiative to other communities if donors could come in to support.
“We wish to extend this initiative to more communities since the malnutrition burden in Obuasi is very high”, said Victor Baah, the Project Manager of Holystic Nutrition said.