Wasting Prevention
Donors: DFID funded MQSUN+ facility
Collaborators: MQSUN+/PATH; Rebecca Brown and Jose Luis Álvarez Morán (ENN Consultants)
ENN project lead and contact: Carmel Dolan
Timeframe: Completes May 2018
Background
The global burden of wasting (52 million children 0-59 months of age) is a major global public health crisis. The World Health Organisation (WHO)'s current definition of wasting is below -2 z-scores of thmedian WHO growth standards. However, both low mid-upper arm circumference (MUAC) of <125mm and bilateral nutritional oedema /kwashiorkor are also classified and treated as acute malnutrition. Wasting can lead to death but also affects children's prospects of surviving and thriving in all areas of their lives. Repeated episodes of wasting can impair linear growth, with knock-on effects for economic development.
The treatment of wasting has expanded beyond humanitarian emergencies, with services now routinely integrated into health systems across Africa, parts of Asia and the Middle East. Nonetheless, treatment is available for an estimated 3 million children per year or less than 15% coverage, leaving a significant treatment deficit. An estimated 8.5 million of wasted children are infants under six months of age, although quality evidence and practice for treating this group lags behind. Furthermore, nutrition-specificand nutrition-sensitive activities to prevent wasting in all its forms lack robust evidence of their effectiveness.
Project summary
The UK Department for International Development (DFID) has requested that MQSUN+ support DFID and the wider nutrition community to accelerate coordinated action to develop evidence of what works to prevent wasting. The outputs from the first phase of the project were a briefing note on what we currently know about the aetiology of wasting (led by Tanya Khara, ENN Technical Director), and a more detailed review of evidence and stakeholder opinion on what works for the prevention of wasting (led by ENN consultants).
A second phase of this project was undertaken to build on the research gaps identified in phase 1. This phase comprised a research prioritisation exercise with leading experts in this field to establish research priorities for strengthening current approaches to wasting prevention. Read the published paper here.
Publications
The aetiology of wasting (ENN, 2018)
Prevention of child wasting (ENN, 2020)
Read our new work on wasting prevention here.
More like this
Blog post: Wasted opportunity? What we do know about preventing wasting
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FEX: The current state of evidence and thinking on wasting prevention
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Wasting Prevention Survey - Introduction
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en-net: Request for contributions of grey literature on wasting prevention
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Resource: The Current State of Evidence and Thinking on Wasting Prevention
A synthesis of published, grey literature and stakeholder opinion on what works to prevent wasting produced by the ENN, through the MQSUN+ project. This report compliments...
en-net: Announcing a New Research Prioritisation Exercise for Improving Wasting Prevention
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Resource: Strengthening the Humanitarian Development Nexus for Nutrition in Protracted Crises
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ENN is embarking on a research prioritisation exercise on wasting prevention for UK DFID through the MQSUN+ project. Read about the project here and find out how you can get...
en-net: Invitation to participate in wasting prevention research prioritisation
We invite you to participate in a survey to prioritise research in the prevention of wasting, under the wasting prevention project managed by ENN and funded by DFID through the...
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View this article as a pdf Leveraging efforts for joint wasting and stunting programming in Indonesia This article outlines how wasting treatment was integrated into stunting...
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FEX: The Wasting-Stunting Technical Interest Group: Summarising the work to date
This is a summary of a Field Exchange field article that was included in issue 67. The original article was authored by Natalie Sessions and Tanya Khara. Natalie Sessions is a...
Resource: Research prioritisation exercise for improving wasting prevention: Project summary
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FEX: A review of the humanitarian nutrition response in North-East Nigeria
View this article as a pdf Lisez cet article en français ici By Alison Donnelly, Joanne Chui and Arja Huestis Alison Donnelly has more than 10 years of experience...
FEX: Link NCA offers a new opportunity to study drivers of concurrent wasting and stunting (WaSt)
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FEX: Management of severe acute malnutrition by community health workers: Early results of Action Against Hunger research
View this article as a pdf Lisez cet article en français ici By Pilar Charle-Cuellar, Noemi Lopez-Ejeda, Magloire Bunkembo, Abdias Ogobara Dougnon and Hassane Toukou...
Reference this page
chloe (). Wasting Prevention. www.ennonline.net/ourwork/researchandreviews/wastingprevention
(ENN_5869)