Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Resource Review
Breastfeeding gives a baby a healthy start in life that extends into adulthood and can even impact nations as a whole. This advocacy brief describes the various benefits of breastfeeding, focusing on the reduction of childhood overweight risk and obesity that can extend into adulthood. On a larger scale, it advocates for breastfeeding as a means to reduce healthcare costs and support the development of nations.
Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Resource Review
The complementary feeding period from 6 to 23 months of age is important for promoting physical and cognitive development, the effects of which will last into adulthood. This UNICEF guidance not only provides information on the benefits of and steps for complementary feeding, but also recognizes the difficulties many face in providing nutritious and sustainable diets for young children. It provides frameworks and interventions for improving diets based on these constraints at the individual, institutional, and policy levels.
Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Resource Review
Maternal depression can have a great impact on the health and development of both a mother and her child during pregnancy and for up to a year postpartum. This brief explores the risk factors that can lead to maternal depression, focusing heavily on the potential role specific nutrients play in supporting a mother’s mental health and the fetus’ development. It also discusses nutrition interventions during pregnancy, acknowledging where there is room for improvement, especially regarding preventative measures in low- and middle-income countries.
Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Resource Review
This article summarizes findings from 10 studies to assess the impact of preventative nutrition interventions on the health and nutrition of 10-19 year-olds in low- and middle-income countries. Although the authors aimed to assess the impact of calcium/vitamin D supplementation/fortification, iron supplementation with or without folic acid, zinc supplementation, and multiple-micronutrient fortification, they did not find enough evidence to draw conclusive implications for practice.
Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Resource Review
Although the movement to eradicate malnutrition has been gaining momentum, countries are still struggling to achieve their nutrition goals. This article emphasizes the important role health systems play in nutrition intervention and examines how they are, or are not, reaching critical groups. It assesses the opportunity gap between coverage of the nutrition intervention and coverage of the health service and which groups and subpopulations are being overlooked to provide recommendations for how health systems can achieve nutrition-related goals.
Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Resource Review
Pregnancy and breastfeeding lower a mother’s nutrient stores, potentially affecting her nutritional status upon conceiving another child. This article evaluates the benefits of nutrition interventions during previous pregnancy and the postpartum period as a way to improve the growth of a subsequent child, specifically through supplementing lipid-based nutrient supplements (LNS), multiple micronutrients (MMN), and iron plus folic acid (IFA).
Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Resource Review
Despite the positive impact breastfeeding has on maternal and child health during infancy and beyond, exclusive breastfeeding is still underutilized. This review examines the costs of implementing and scaling-up breastfeeding interventions at multiple levels and the barriers to intervening in low-, middle- and high-income countries. The authors found that breastfeeding interventions cost more in high-income countries than in low- and middle-income countries.
Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Resource Review
FEWS NET experts released a special report to document the wettest rainfall season in 40 years in East Africa, from October-December of 2019. The impacts of this monumental rain season on food security are profound and have left 18-22 million people facing crisis outcomes in the region (Integrated Phase Classification 3 or higher). Climate shocks have led to challenges to resilience. Flooding has displaced hundreds of thousands in the region.
Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Resource Review
In 2018, Save the Children, with support from USAID’s Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance and the Office of Food for Peace, implemented a multi-purpose cash transfer “Plus” program in Colombia. The program was designed in response to the influx of Venezuelans into Colombia due to political and economic unrest. Cash transfers were meant to cover basic needs in an effort to prevent emergence of negative coping strategies, which impact child safety and nutritional status.
Multi-Sectoral Nutrition Resource Review
Ready-to-use therapeutic foods (RUTF), dosed by body weight, are the basis of treatment for uncomplicated severe acute malnutrition. Weight gain is the main way to monitor the effectiveness of such therapies. Previous reporting claimed that a lower-than-recommended dose of RUTF led to no less weight gain than the standard dose. This study was designed to examine that reporting and investigate the composition of gained mass based on this differential. The authors found there was no significant difference in tissue accretion in the lower dose of RUTF than in the standard dose.