Hauwa, the Goldmother
After the death of his mother in Ngala, northeast Nigeria, a malnourished baby from a displaced family is nursed back to health by his stepmom.
Hauwa Modu sits beside a health worker at the ISS IDP Camp nutrition clinic in Ngala, northeast Nigeria, gently rocking baby Babagana on her thighs. The UNICEF-supported clinic, the only one catering to infant wasting at the camp with a population of over 40,000 displaced individuals, overflows with caregivers and children acutely ill with malnutrition.
It is her second visit to the clinic and the health worker is happy with Babagana’s progress.
“Babagana has improved since we admitted him into the nutrition programme last week,’’ says Zainabu Abdul, the health worker, while counting the empty sachets of ready-to-use therapeutic food (RUTF) Hauwa just handed over to her.
Submission of empty sachets of RUTF before the issuance of new ones is standard practice at the clinic which attends to a daily average of 25 acutely malnourished children. It helps health workers ensure that the nutrient-dense RUTF are eaten by children who need them and not sold in the open market.
The health worker handed 18 sachets of RUTF to Hauwa. In addition to multi vitamins and other drugs, they will keep Babagana healthy until his next visit.
His weight increased from 5.6 kilogrammes to 6 kilogrammes within a week. His Mid-Upper Arm Circumference (MUAC) also improved from 11 to 11.4. These are good signs that he is recovering fast,’’ she adds
The ISS Camp is one of four camps and a reception centre for displaced persons and returnees in Ngala. A combined population of 85,000 displaced individuals live in the border town, making it one of the towns with the highest number of displaced persons in Nigeria’s northeast region.
With loss of income opportunities and pressure on sanitation, education and health facilities, children at the camp face serious challenges, including high cases of malnutrition, food insecurity and water shortage, among others. Children, women and men trek to Gamboru, a neighbouring community about 6 kilometers away to fetch potable water for their sanitation needs.
UNICEF with the support of the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), is supporting the camp clinic with RUTF, drugs and micronutrients to help children fight malnutrition and survive. Through the Multisectoral Integrated Nutrition Action for Children and Adolescents (MINA) project, caregivers have also been trained to prevent malnutrition and screen their children for same.
For Babagana however, Hauwa’s kindness has played a major role in his recovery. With her husband far away in Lagos to work and no regular income, Hauwa solely presides over a home of 12 children, including a severely malnourished Babagana. Along with her own eight biological children, Hauwa is the primary caregiver of the four children left behind by Yassaya, her late husband’s other wife.
Though she has a four-month-old baby, Hauwa has been responsible for the primary care of her four stepchildren since their mother died in April.
But the mother of eight simply sees this as a duty.
“My husband often travels to work in Lagos and sends money to us for upkeep. But the money is not regular or enough to support all of us. Babagana is like my child and if I don’t take care of him, who will? I can’t abandon him. Things are difficult but we are still family. It is difficult to feed. It is difficult to get water. We are just managing whatever we have,’’ she says.
Hauwa says she has seen to it that Babagana strictly takes his medication including the RUTF.
Everybody in the family wants him to recover quickly. I have told his siblings to wash their hands before and after eating and after visiting the toilet. It is our own actions that will help him to get better fast,’’ adds Hauwa.
