In Which Food Allergies Are A Luxury 3rd-World Kids Can’t Afford
on Zoe Page (Sierra Leone), 04/Nov/2010 20:13, 34 days ago
It is feeding time at the zoo. I mean, feeding day for the malnourished children. I get to the hospital and watch a‘health talk’ which mentions the Polio campaign last week, and the upcoming nets one. It’s done through a loud-hailer which makes it hard to understand (as does the language) but the dozens of mums and babies (and one dad) listen with rapt attention.Back in the nurses’ room they are setting up for the session. After the talk, the children have an ‘appetite test’. They are given a foil pouch of the wonderfully namedPlump Nuts. The ingredients say it is oil, sugar and peanuts, in other words peanut butter, of a sort. They also get beakers of water: it may not be a baby food that needs mixing, but like with regular PB, you can’t swallow huge quantities without some liquid. The only thing is, this isn’t likely to be filtered water. Vasile has bought powdered milk (made by Nestle) and we were discussing over breakfast only this morning the whole formula / dirty water / bad ol' Nestle situation of the 90s. I hope this stuff makes the kids better, not worse, than when they arrived.Each small packet has a whopping 500 calories in. Some wolf it down, some take a bit and then throw it back up. I don’t know what happens to children who don’t have an ‘appetite’ and I don’t WANT to know what happens to any who have a peanut allergy...though I have a sneaking suspicion such things are a luxury afforded only to first world children with neurotic parents (and epi-pens at the ready).After they eat (or don’t) each child is weighed. They then see the nurses, who give them a week’s supply of Plump Nuts, based on their weight / age. These are truly tiny kids. One, I’m told, is 9 months old. He looks less than half that. Their cards are signed, and the parents told to bring them back in another week. There is a hand-written poster on the wall explaining that the food supplements are only for very under-weight children, and not to be shared. Another mum comes in and my favourite friendly nurse tells me there are ’12 people eating from the pot’ in her family, so there’s not enough left for the baby. I wonder why they don’t start with the youngest first – after all the small amount a 1 year old would need would be an amount most adults could go without, especially seeing the size of some of these mothers.Health education, Salone styleMmmm, Plump Nuts!