A boy who suffers malnutrition receives medical treatment at a hospital in Sanaa, Yemen, on Oct. 19, 2015. The UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) estimated that 537,000 children under the age of five are at risk of severe acute malnutrition in Yemen, which represents a threefold increase from the number of 160,000 monitored in March, Farhan Haq, the deputy UN spokesman, told reporters here. (Xinhua/Hani Ali)
UNITED NATIONS, Oct. 16 (Xinhua) -- The UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) estimated that 537,000 children under the age of five are at risk of severe acute malnutrition in Yemen, which represents a threefold increase from the number of 160,000 monitored in March, Farhan Haq, the deputy UN spokesman, told reporters here Friday.
"This means that one in eight children under five is at risk of severe malnutrition," Haq said at a daily news briefing here.
Almost 1.3 million children under five are moderately malnourished compared with 690,000 children prior to the crisis.
"Yemen's alarming malnutrition levels are aggravated by the limited availability of, and lack of access to food, due to blocked or damaged delivery routes and restrictions on food and fuel imports," Haq said.
At the same time, livelihoods have been disrupted, unemployment has risen, fuel and water prices have surged and availability remains erratic.
To address increasing malnutrition levels, aid agencies have scaled up assistance and treated 97,000 children for severe acute malnutrition in the past six months, while 65,000 children have been treated for moderate acute malnutrition, according to Haq.
About 3.8 million children have received food supplements, and 933,000 pregnant and lactating women benefited from supplementary feeding, he added.
