Nearly half of all deaths in children under five are attributable to undernutrition. Three million lives are lost each year to it (UNICEF 2016).
USAID’s Multi-Sectoral Anemia Task Force was established in 2011 to increase the coverage of anemia prevention and control interventions among pregnant women and children under two, with concentrated efforts to reduce maternal and neonatal deaths in specific countries.
The Government of Sierra Leone has recognized that an evidence-based and collaborative approach across sectors is critical to reduce anemia. At the request of the Sierra Leone government, SPRING supported the establishment of a national anemia working group under the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) movement in 2016 to guide multi-sectoral and multi-stakeholder anemia prevention and control.
SPRING provides technical support to the Kyrgyz Republic Ministry of Health (MoH) to develop national guidelines related to anemia prevention and control, as well as prevention and treatment of helminth infestation in the country.
SPRING works closely with the Ghana Health Service (GHS) to strengthen anemia programming. SPRING conducted and finalized a landscape analysis that provides information on the risk factors of anemia, assesses coverage of programs implicated in anemia prevention and/or control, and reviews the country’s anemia-related policies.
At the request of the Government of Uganda, SPRING has been supporting a country-driven process to address anemia and to strengthen multi-sectoral and multi-stakeholder anemia programming. SPRING started by conducting a landscape analysis to better understand the factors contributing to anemia.
Food and Nutrition Bulletin, 2016.
SPRING/Uganda partnered with another USAID-funded project, Regional Health Integration to Enhance Services in Southwest (RHITES/SW), to strengthen efforts to reduce stunting and anemia in the southwestern region of Uganda.
Science Direct, February 2017.
SPRING/Kyrgyz Republic hosted an event on Friday, February 10, 2017, entitled “Strengthening Linkages between Agriculture and Nutrition.” SPRING presented on nutrition-sensitive agriculture, an approach wherein agriculture initiatives and projects both target and yield nutritional outcomes in addition to traditional agriculture results.