GUNTUR: The district medical and health department in coordination with the ICDS is conducting MAM, SAM programmes to solve malnutrition among children.
Children up to 5 years are categorised as SAM (Severe Acute Malnutrition) and MAM (Moderate Acute Malnutrition) based on weight for height criteria.
According to the latest National Family Health Survey-2020, 62,489 children in the district are showing poor growth and 28,436 are suffering from stunted growth.
Malnutrition among children occurs during the first two years of life and is virtually irreversible after that as more than 90 per cent of the brain develops during the first two years. So in order to provide balanced nutrition, the special teams are conducting checkups on children and are forwarding the details to anganwadis.