LAHORE: Of the 5,386,037 children screened as part of the ongoing nutrition and breastfeeding week, 240,845 (0.24 million) were identified as malnourished.

Similarly, of the 1,597,855 pregnant and lactating women examined, 104,288 were found malnourished, said Mother and Child Health and Nutrition Programme (IRMNCH&NP) Project Director Dr Syed Mukhtar Hussain Shah on Thursday while releasing the data collected during the first three days of province-wide nutrition and breastfeeding week.

Dr Shah said IRMNCH&NP’s teams would reach more than 10 million children, minor girls and one million pregnant women in door-to-door drive.

During the drive, 2.8m children up to two years of age would be given vitamins while sachet of multi minerals would be provided to the minors. So far, ORS, multimineral and Zinc supplement doses had been distributed among 2,309,045 children.

A comprehensive nutrition strategy would be adopted after collecting results of screening of children and pregnant and lactating women as part of the nutrition and breastfeeding week that would continue till Oct 6, he said.

Published in Dawn, October 5th, 2018