Tackling Malnutrition: Improving Both Food and Health Systems

Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, nearly one in three people around the world had at least one form of malnutrition, and based on current trends this number is set to rise to one in every two by 2025. Now due to the COVID-19, the world risks backsliding nutrition gains with irreversible impacts on mortality and lost potential. By 2022 COVID-19 could result in an additional 11.9 million severely malnourished children. In many parts of the world, malnutrition will likely be the most deadly and long-lasting consequence of the COVID-19 pandemic – killing more people than the virus itself. The COVID-19 pandemic has made it clearer now more than ever, in order to tackle malnutrition, an overhaul of the world’s food and health systems is needed.
Panelists for the dialogue included.
- Teresa Welsh, Devex Senior Reporter
- Roger Mathisen, Southeast Asia regional director at Alive & Thrive
- Ruth Oniang’o, nutritionist, professor, and former member of Kenya’s Parliament
- Meera Shekar, global lead of health, nutrition, and population at the World Bank.
- Heather Danton, project director, at USAID Advancing Nutrition led by JSI Research & Training Institute, Inc.
Watch a full recording of the webinar below.