Babies get an edge on life

Rosa Gonzales is smiling widely as the health worker weighing her 18-month-old daughter Nina, on a bright blue fabric sling in the doorway of the packed community centre, gives the young mum the best news she has heard in months.

‘Si’ she affirms in Spanish. ‘She has put on weight and is now in the healthy range.’

It has been a tough year for Rosa, who lives with her husband, in the impoverished San Jan village of the Lanaguarna, Dominican Republic.

Victor Brott

Nina has been a sickly baby since her birth and Rosa has had a difficult time helping her gain weight. Like most Dominican mothers she breastfed her child, but when it came time to introduce solids, being poor meant she could not afford the highly nutritious foods that would give Nina her best start in life.

There were times when she thought she might even lose her daughter, who was seriously underweight for her age and not thriving as babies should.

But then she joined Plan’s health programme for mothers and babies and their lives changed for the better.

The programme, held at the community centre of Lanaguarna – offers weigh-ins and nutritional programmes for all children under five years of age and advice for mothers.

In its first phase, the programme is aimed at giving children the best start in life, through health monitoring and use of nutritional supplements.

Those who are found to be underweight for their age are graded according to their level of malnutrition – low, moderate and severe, and provided with a year’s supply of supplements, such as powdered milk, medicines, oats, maize and margarine.

They are weighed monthly to see how they are progressing. ‘This is just the first phase, just to move the children to normal weights and educate their mothers. We are planning to introduce a food security programme soon with gardens and small animals and develop an agricultural programme to help improve their methods of growing food.’