By Tina George, Minna
Wife of Niger State Governor, Dr. Amina Abubakar Bello, has chided the Niger state Drug and Hospital Consumables Management Agency, for storing the Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF), saying it is meant for malnourished children.
Speaking at the High-level Advocacy and Policy Dialogue on the Nutrition Situation in Niger state on Tuesday, Bello lamented that the RUTF, which should be given to the children, were locked up in the store.
RUTF (Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food) is a vitamin and mineral fortified peanut paste mixed with dry milk products which aid in curing children suffering from Severe Acute Malnutrition.
The Governor’s Wife who was represented by the Director Planning, Research, and Statistics of the Ministry of Health, Pharmacist Hamzat Tijani Yahaya urged the agency to stop storing the RUTF and distribute it to the children who need them.
“I have been to the Central Medicine Store and I notice that there is a large stock of RUTF there, I want to state that the RUTF is not meant to be stored but to be distributed to the children who need it. We need to stop storing RUTF. They are for malnourished children.”
Speaking further, Bello stated that the state has a lot of political will in combating malnutrition stating that strategies are in place to reduce the unpleasant indices of malnutrition in the state.
Also lending her voice to the plea of the Governor’s Wife, the Technical Advise of the Niger state Committee on Food and Nutrition, Hajiya Amina Isah pointed that if these RUTFs are not distributed to the children who need it, the state may start losing its children who are suffering from malnutrition.
“RUTF is food and drugs for malnourished children. If you continue storing them there, they will expire and the children may and up dying from malnutrition.”
Isah then called for an intensive train8nf of health workers on how to handle and recommend RUTF adding that, “you cannot give the RUTF to people who have not been trained.”
The Commissioner of Budget and Planning, Mamman Musa in his address said that the challenges of malnutrition in the state are really adding that it is threatening the productive asset base of the state.
He added that community leadership is key to achieving success while he disclosed that the government is putting up good policies, plans, and adequate funding support to meet goals and target sets.
