Despite the availability of the peanut-based paste Plumpy’nut, children under 5 are suffering from malnutrition at the Dolo Ado refugee camps in Ethiopia.
Last month, the U.S. Agency for International Development and the Famine Early Warning System Network reported that refugees would “regularly” sell Plumpy’nut to buy sugar, tea leaves, powder milk and meat from the local market. Children would also go to the market to exchange the treatment food for sugar.
“The food is there, there is easy access, but why is the situation so bad? This needs to be investigated,” Giorgia Testolin said, the Guardian reports. She is the head of the refugee section of the World Food Program Ethiopia.
This is one of the many concerns relief officials are facing in Ethiopia. Another is the surge of refugees at Dolo Ado, which currently plays host to 37,000 people.
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