A nongovernmental organisation in Kwara state, Civil Society Scaling-up Nutrition in Nigeria (CS-SUNN) has described malnutrition as a silent crisis that claims lives of 2,300 Nigerian children daily.
Speaking with the Nigerian Tribune at a two-day advocacy meeting in Ilorin on Tuesday, the project officer of the agency, Mr. Ubah Nnaemeka, said that if nothing was done, number of deaths would increase daily due to malnutrition.
The Project Officer, who stated that globally out of a population of 7 billion, about 2 billion suffer from micro nutrient malnutrition, adding that, “Out of 5 billion adult worldwide, nearly 2 billion are overweight or obese with one in every 12 person having type two diabetes,” he said.
Nnaemeka warned that malnutrition has the ability of sapping intelligence from childhood and by extension compromising the future of Nigerian leaders.
He also said that Nigeria presently accounted for the 11 per cent of the total global below five years deaths with 37 per cent of children under the age of five stunted.
He added that 18 per cent of the children were wasted and 29 per cent were underweight.
The CS-SUNN project officer stated that only 17 per cent of mothers in Nigeria breast feed their children according to the National Demographic and Health Survey of 2013.
Nnaemeka described malnutrition to include three indicators he listed as over nutrition, under nutrition and micro nutrient deficiency.
Also speaking, Dr Uthman Mubashir, CS-SUNN (Kwara) Chairman Local Working Group said the NGO deals with nutrition of women and children in Nigeria.
He said malnutrition is a collective problem and needs a collective response from all stakeholders.
Mubashir advocated for a strong voice by decision makers to create the desired changes in the country as regards malnutrition.