In a piece of good news in the sphere of health for Uttarakhand, the special diet conceived by the state women and child development department to take on the grim problem of malnutrition widespread among the children of the state has brought about positive changes. It is believed that the diet would go a long way in ridding the hill state of malnutrition while working as a substitute for Horlicks, Complan, Bournvita and the like.
Currently, they have been producing a healthy powder, comprising Gram, soybean, sesame, ground nut and jiggery which the children can drink either with milk or poured in plain water. The special health drink is known as Severely Acute Malnourished (SAM).
Talking to The Pioneer, the director state women and child development department Vimmi Raman said they were exulted over bringing it out which would prove a panacea for the malnourished found across the country in the coming days. As per the data, the number of the malnourished children in the state is very high, she stated. “In view of the grimness of the situation, the Chief Minister Harish Rawat recently adopted malnourished child so as to stimulate us into devising ways to take the problem head-on. We took it as a challenge and our initiatives are now showing results,” she said.
“As we have limited resources we could not afford to provide these unfortunate children with the conventional healthy diets. We were thus obsessed with how to help them rid of the problem by providing them with nutritious supplement at affordable rate. While turning our minds over it, we concluded that the best option was to prepare a kind of supplement ourselves that would serve the purpose. We studied the composition of the existing food supplements in depth and prepared one rich with protein and carbohydrate. First, we consumed it ourselves before offering it to the visitors. Being sure of the fact that it was safe, we started giving the supplement to the malnourished children. We have been providing them with it for the past two months. Results obtained from the first month proved astonishing. The children previously lethargic and unhealthy were seen brimming with energy. Enthused by the positive changes discernible in the children, we started giving the supplement to other children. The result is the same, the children consuming it showing magical results. The supplement can be consumed with milk or if milk is unavailable, it can be taken in plain water too,” she said.
Raman further said that things are currently in the experimental mode. “If the result continues to be positive we would go for its large-scale production, taking assistance from the self -help groups (SHG). later we would provide this food to the pregnant women as part of food supplement. This would also throw fresh job opportunities for the Aaganwadi centres. Besides, the state can earn through selling it. What is important, it would make our future generation healthy. And subsequently, the whole nation would derive benefits,” she added.