OVC Care and Nutrition in Cameroon

Across the Bui and Donga Mantung Divisions of Cameroon’s North West Region, in communities where Nascent Solutions is implementing its International Food Relief Program (IFRP), health workers, school teachers and community leaders are noticing an exciting phenomenon: the number of children with distended abdomens, sparse, reddish head hair and vacant stares is diminishing dramatically. Parents are ecstatic as they notice that their malnourished children have shed these symptoms and have started growing again.

The IFRP in this region is in its 5th year and while there has always been anecdotal evidence of its effectiveness, the results have become even more measurable for Nascent Solutions staff and tangible to its beneficiaries. A grateful widow in Ngarum village in Donga Mantung Division told Nascent’s Cameroon Country Director Fr. Daniel Ache that her once constantly ailing son had been born twice: once when she gave birth to him and the second time when he went on the feeding rolls of the IFRP.

In the village of Fikeng in Oku, Bui Division, an elderly grandmother caring for eight grandchildren whose parents died of AIDS describes the Breedlove dehydrated vegetable soup mix as her “pharmacy.” She told Nascent Solutions staff that since her children started eating the product, she no longer needs to take them to the health center for their constant ailments, because the soup mix seemed to have cured them of whatever they were suffering from.

As a consequence of having one of the highest HIV/AIDS prevalence rates in the country (over 11.5%), Cameroon’s Northwest Region also leads in the number of AIDS orphans. The difficulties facing the victims of HIV/AIDS, especially orphans and the aging grandparents who care for them, have been compounded by the rising prices of basic necessities, such as food, housing, medication and access to clean water, particularly in rural areas.