Rescue Children Suffering From Severe Malnutrition

People often refer to our 16 Nutritional Rehabilitation Homes as “places where miracles happen” – clinics where children enter severely emaciated and malnourished and exit a month later healthy and robust.

We introduced this model approach for treatment and prevention of malnutrition in 1998 and have nourished more than 14,000 severely malnourished children back to health in one of our clinics across Nepal. An equal number of mothers have been educated in nutrition to better care for their children when they return home.

We also work with the Nepal government to commit to managing the NRHs once they were established and successfully in operation for 5 years. This model leverages our impact by allowing us to create new innovations while the government maintains the clinics currently operating. So far, Nepal government hospitals have successfully taken over the management of 10 NRHs.

In addition to nursing children back to health, and teaching their mothers the basics of good nutrition, our staff conducts nutrition camps to reach out to rural and marginalized communities and provides training to child care workers, teachers, and other stakeholders on the management of malnutrition and diet.

Due to poverty and widespread ignorance about nutrition, nearly half of Nepal’s children are severely malnourished.

Thank you for your continued support. Namaste!

Links:

• Nepal Youth Foundation

NYF temporarily switched the focus of its nutrition program from residential care to community outreach - conducting nutrition education workshops in districts hard hit by the earthquakes last spring.

A team of doctors and nurses traveled to villages in Dhading district and screened children for malnutrition and other medical conditions, while nutritionists taught their mothers the basics of good nutrition and sanitation at a half dozen such camps held throughout the region.

The program shift was necessary because a lengthy blockade at the Indian border, lifted just last month, nearly crippled the tiny land-locked country. Without crucial supplies such as cooking fuel, medicine and food, NYF staff curtailed the number of children it could care for in its 16 Nutritional Rehabilitation Homes.

The country is gradually regaining its footing, and NYF plans to bring it centers back to capacity.

An estimated 40 percent of all Nepali children are malnourished. In NYF’s residential program, severely malnourished children are nursed back to good health, while their mothers learn to prepare healthy meals using locally available food.    

Links:

• Nepal Youth Foundation