ibironkeeniola 
No fewer than 124 children have died from malnutrition in Kaduna State, the Kaduna State Primary Health Care Development Board (KADSPHCDB) has said.
According to the Board’s Nutrition Officer, Mrs Ramatu Musa, the children died between January and September 2020.
The Nutrition Officer, Represented by the KADSPHCDB Monitoring and Evaluation Officer, Jibril Isah, also disclosed that 15,329 malnourished children were being cured at Community Management of Acute Malnutrition (CMAM) centres across the state.
He added that 2,128 had defaulted treatment while 264 remained unrecovered.
On his part, the State Coordinator of Civil Society-Scaling up Nutrition (CS-SUNN), Silas Spencer Ideva, observed that malnutrition amongst children and women of reproductive age continues to be a major challenge to health development in the state.
Ideva noted that funding and mobilisation have equally affected the plans to address the challenges.
He added, “Two of the most critical factors mitigating the impact of this commitment is the inadequate funding and coordination of required intervention plans which is why we are bringing stakeholders together to see possible areas of engaging the state government to do more.
“For example, each malnourished child required N24,000 to get Young Child Feeding (IYCF) and if you multiply that by the number of children currently on admission, you will see there is a need for serious budgetary provision for this course.”
Speaking earlier, Musa pointed out that the state has been able to increase CMAM centres in the state from 10 in two LGAs to 77 in 15 LGAs.
She added that the state government’s interventions have so far helped to improve access to treatment for malnutrition.
According to her, more health officials have been mobilised and more individuals reached with messages on healthy feeding practices for children, women of child-bearing age and men alike.