Acute malnutrition ravages Northern Uganda

A woman bends down to smear the verandah of her grass-thatched hut with cow dung in Opit Upper Cell, Omoro Town Council in Omoro District. Her neighbour, Night Aloyo, sits on a piece of cloth spread on a dusty verandah. She is carrying a sickly-looking child, whose dirty brown hair is sparsely distributed on the head. He is one-year-old.

“He is sick most of the time. The disease started when he was 10-months-old. He has persistent diarrhoea and I estimate that on average, we spend Shs20,000 per week on his treatment,” she says.

Aloyo and her husband make a living through…