Today, a perfect storm of COVID-19, conflict, extreme drought, global supply chain disruptions, and historic inflation is driving rapid increases in famine-like conditions and deaths from malnutrition. And children are bearing the worst of the crisis.
Wasting, the most severe and life-threatening form of undernutrition, accounts for 1 in 5 deaths among children under 5. Since the beginning of the year, the global hunger crisis has forced one new child every 60 seconds to suffer from severe wasting.
Ready-to-use therapeutic food, or RUTF, is a lifesaving medicinal food used to treat severely malnourished children that are too weak or sick to consume regular food. While the treatment is effective, with a 70-90% recovery rate, only about 1 in 3 wasted children have access to it.
But ending child wasting is possible. In July 2022, the U.S. Agency for International Development made the single largest investment in wasting treatment in history: $200 million to UNICEF that will deliver lifesaving treatment to an additional 2.4 million children. Other donors were encouraged to follow their lead — $250 million on top of that in annual investment for wasting treatment is what it would take to begin reaching all severely wasted children across the globe.
Speaking at an event co-hosted by the Eleanor Crook Foundation on July 18, USAID Administrator Samantha Power explained the reasons behind USAID’s decision to prioritize investment in RUTF. “This is one of the best investments, one of the best bargains that we have in our toolkit, for dealing with hunger and for dealing with the need for more nutrition and for — ultimately, for development,” she said.
Explore this visual story to learn more.
About the author
Olivia Govik
Olivia is a Senior Editorial Associate and Reporter at Devex. Based in our Barcelona office, she mainly works with bringing partnerships content to life in different formats. She holds degrees in communications, political sciences, and international relations, and developed a passion for global development while studying and working in different parts of the world. Prior to joining Devex, she worked in Brussels on communications related to European Union-funded development projects.
