About 6.4 mln Nigerian children suffer from acute malnutrition: ICRC

ABUJA, March 10 (Xinhua) -- Nearly 6.4 million children under the age of five are suffering from acute malnutrition across Nigeria's northeast, northwest, and north-central regions, a dire consequence of the conflicts in Africa's most populous country, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) has said.

In a report released Monday, the ICRC noted that more than 15 years into the armed conflict in northeast Nigeria, food insecurity is threatening the lives of many of the country's youngest citizens.

"Children, as well as pregnant and lactating women, are most at risk. In hard-to-reach areas, especially in Borno and parts of Yobe, rates of severe acute malnutrition remain persistently high," the humanitarian organization said.

Without access to farmland or stable income, the link between displacement, food insecurity, and malnutrition becomes direct, and children are often the first to suffer, the ICRC said.

It gave instances of severe cases in the northeastern part of Nigeria, including the case of Umar, a 22-month-old baby admitted to a nutritional stabilization center in Damaturu, the capital of Yobe State, whose "face and feet were so swollen that his skin seemed stretched to the limit."

Without urgent treatment, children with this condition rarely survive, the ICRC said.

"The swelling was a sign of nutritional edema, a severe form of acute malnutrition usually caused by a prolonged lack of essential nutrients in the body," the statement quoted Samira Hassan, a nurse at the Damaturu nutritional stabilization center. ■