‘Malnutrition emergency soon’

LAHORE

Punjab Planning and Development Department Member Dr Shabana Haider has said that Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif will soon declare malnutrition emergency in the province to overcome malnutrition though a comprehensive and robust strategy and involvement of various departments at the district level that will work at the union council level. 

She said the malnutrition addressing committees had been established at the district level that included senior officers from health, education, agriculture, livestock and fisheries departments to implement the strategy and get tangible results.

Addressing a seminar on the district malnutrition addressing committee at a local hotel here, Dr Shabana Haider said malnutrition was bigger issue than load-shedding because Pakistan’s GDP would  increase by 2.5 percent if the issue of load-shedding was resolved, but GDP would increase by 10 percent if the issue of malnutrition was addressed.

World Food Programme (WFP) Provincial Chief Shezada Rashid, UNICEF Punjab Health and Nutrition specialist Dr Tahir Mehmood, Chief Nutritionist Muhammad Aslam and representative of WFP Dr Lamia Mehmood, besides senior district officers of health, education, agriculture, fisheries from Rawalpindi, Jhelum, Chakwal and Attock districts were also present.

Dr Shabana Haider said according to national nutrition survey 2011, the trend of breastfeeding had reduced to 17 percent from 51 percent in the last 10 years and this alarming situation was also a major cause of malnutrition in the newborns.

She said malnutrition badly damaged mental health of the children due to which education also suffered and it also caused diseases like hypertension, diabetes, paralysis and other fatal diseases.

Dr Tahir Mehmood said the Punjab government had prepared a revolutionary and robust strategy to address the issue of malnutrition and it would have far-reaching impact.

He said that according to the national nutrition survey 2011, 4.5 million children in Punjab were underweight and 4.5 million were also stunted children, and that situation could be improved through better nutrition.