She disclosed that she was disillusioned with treatments administered to Annette yet none of them worked.

“Then one day without further delays I decided to walk a 10 Km distance while carrying her on my back from my village to Chiwamba Health Centre,” Thandiwe said adding that it was at the health centre where Annette’s sickness puzzle was identified and solved.

“She was diagnosed with acute malnutrition hence admitted into the Nutrition Rehabilitation Programme,” said the mother of six adding that her child survived after being put under a special care at Chiwamba Health Centre.

According to Malawi’s 2010 Demographic and Health Survey 4 per 100 of Malawi’s under-five children population are wasted while 47 per 100 are stunted.

Malnutrition remains one of Malawi’s infant killers despite the good news that in recent years the country is on the right route to meet the Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of two thirds reduction in under-five mortality between 1990 and 2015.

The United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF)’s statistics disclose that one in every 10 Malawian children died of malnutrition in 2008.

But Chiwamba Health Centre’s Medical Assistant Lackson Mbowela said it was possible to save children from malnutrition especially if its prevention process starts within homes and communities.

“The major causes of malnutrition apart from inadequate food in the home are poor food preparation, ignorance of proper infant feeding practices which forbid children from eating certain types of foods such as eggs,” he said.

The United Nations Office of the Humanitarian Coordinator in Lilongwe says the number of new admissions of children with severe acute malnutrition in Outpatient Therapeutic Programmes (OTPs) and Nutrition Rehabilitation Units (NRUs) have been increasing in some districts in Malawi due to poor harvests and high poverty levels (weak purchasing power within the households).

The office gives Balaka District in southern Malawi as an example saying the district’s figure of malnourished children went up by December 2010 as compared to the same month in 2009 (the number of children admitted at OTP sites [severe malnourished children] increased by 14 percent in the district.

The Principal Secretary (PS) in the Department of HIV and AIDS and Nutrition President Bingu wa Mutharika’s Office, Mary Shawa admitted malnutrition is one single stumbling block to Malawi’s social-economic development.

“Due to malnutrition problem about half of the country’s population is stunted, hence unproductive,” she said.

In recognition that malnutrition is an enemy to the country’s development, the Irish government and the World Food Programme (WFP) towards the end of last year signed a Memorandum of Understanding for a K225 million grant to support Malawi government in its Supplementary Feeding Programmes (SFPs).

“There is great impact with stunted growth in as far as the country’s development is concerned. For example as a country Malawi is currently struggling to develop because most of its citizens are victims of stunted growth,” Shawa said.

She explained that stunted growth make people find it hard to grasp most developmental issues.

“The development of the brain of malnourished children is greatly affected, and as a result their thinking capacity is also negatively affected. Right now, you find that most people in the country, despite their professional qualifications, utterly fail to grasp issues under discussion because majority were stunted,” Shawa said.

She expounded that although there are relatively low levels of acute malnutrition at this time, treatment is essential to prevent unnecessary morbidity and interventions recommended for the Scaling Up Nutrition under the 1, 000 Special Days Initiative which was launched few months ago in Malawi.

“The grant that the Irish government has provided to the World Food Programme will go a long way in addressing malnutrition in the country,” Shawa said.

The Irish Ambassador to Malawi, Liz Higgins, said the grant is part of her government’s commitment to ensure that, “Malawian households are better nourished and food-secure.”

The WFP Country Director, Abdulaye Diop, also hailed the grant saying the contribution from the Irish Aid to Malawi’s fight against malnutrition was timely.

“It will enable us to reach out more malnourished pregnant or lactating women and children in the country. Using the funds, WFP will buy 302 metric tonnes of fortified corn soya blend; locally know as Likuni Phala (Likuni porridge) and 30 metric tonnes vegetable oil per year for four years, and the commodities will be distributed to about 34, 000 acutely malnourished children and pregnant or lactating women annually up to 2015,”Diop said.

Government through the Ministry of Health admits that malnutrition is the underlying killer of children as it causes 54 per 100 infant deaths per year in Malawi.

To teach people in local communities how to take up initiatives that would prevent health outbreaks including save children’s lives from malnutrition, the ministry therefore, recruits Health Surveillance Assistants (HSAs) and deploy them in the communities countrywide.

The HSAs are a cadre of trained, salaried outreach workers who serve as foot soldiers in the frontline battle against largely preventable childhood diseases in Malawi.

They among other things, visit villagers twice monthly, armed with checklists asking mothers if they have enough Ready-To-Use-Therapeutic -Food (RUTF) for their young children.

The mothers are also counseled on breastfeeding and other ways to provide the food a baby needs to survive as Madalitso Chadewa, an HAS at Chiwamba Health Centre explained.

“Our work involves how people live, do they have enough food? If they do, we counsel them to keep it up. If not, we tell them what is needed and try and find out if they can afford it,” he said.

And the Chiwamba nutrition programme where Annette’s unending sickness puzzle was solved is just part of Unicef’s efforts comprising of hundreds of centres providing ‘Community Therapeutic Care’ in which malnourished children are also treated at home with RUTF across Malawi to fight against the country’s silent enemy-malnutrition.