A one-year intensive sensitization project on child nutrition and family planning has started in 10 vulnerable sub-counties of Kasese district in Uganda.
The project funded by two American international NGO’s, USAID and Strides, is being implemented by Kaneka Rural Clinics Advisory and Nutrition Centres [KARUCAN] a Kasese based community based organization.
“At the end of the project, at least 3,000 children in areas that are hard hit with a lack of knowledge on child nutrition will have been helped to achieve optimal growth and
development both physically and mentally”, KARUCAN Director Nelson Kasaija said on Saturday.
Kasaija said that the first sh.50 million of the four expected disbursements had been received by his organization to kick start the project under the title, ‘Improving reproductive health services among poor communities’.
Kasaija said that with funding from the Belgian Technical Corporation, his organization was putting up a health clinic in Kokonzo in Kasese municipality to provide counselling services mainly on child nutrition and family planning.
Kasese District Health Officer, Dr. Yusufu Baseka, described the project as timely saying the district was faced with a high child mortality rate due to inadequate sensitization and
a refusal to change among many parents.
Maseka said that according to the recent data from various Health Units in the district, 60% of the children in Kasese have stunted growth due to poor nutrition and yet food was available in the homes.
Clinical Officer, Elias Kule, attached to the project, said that they were targeting the communities in the hard to reach areas of the district especially those in the mountains where family planning is still being seen negatively and children are suffering with
high rates of malnutrition.
Kule who works at Bwera Hospital said that many of the parents in Kasese district had the food but that they don’t know how to use it to feed their children properly.
He revealed that recent research between June and July 2011 in Karambi sub-county of Bukonzo West conducted by Bwera Hospital and funded by Strides had established that 58% of the children between six months and 5 years of age were malnourished.
“Mothers leave their children at home to go to the various markets with nobody to cook for them leaving the kids to survive on one poorly prepared meal in 24 hours,” Kule said.
He added that the findings also indicated that many children were from poor families but their mothers fed them on regular meals and they were healthier than those children in seemingly well-to-do families who were surviving on a single meal in 24 hours.
A Senior Nursing Sister at Kilembe Mines Hospital, Sr. Annah Mutazingwa, also reported that 50% of the children who die at the centre lose their lives due ailments associated with malnutrition.
- Kasese Municipality Mayor Godfrey Kabyanga visited the malnuorished children at Kilembe Hospital on 23 December 2011
