June 22, 2008
A Life Saver Called "Plumpynut"
Anderson Cooper Reports On A Nutritional Breakthrough
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'Miracle' Food Saves Lives
Plumpynut is a cheap, nutritious food that is saving starving children in the developing world. Anderson Cooper reports on why this product is effective and how it could save even more lives.
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Niger
Learn about the people, economy and history.
You've probably never heard a good news story about malnutrition, but you’re about to. Every year, malnutrition kills five million children - that's one child every six seconds. But now, the Nobel Prize-winning relief group "Doctors Without Borders" says it finally has something that can save millions of these children.
It's cheap, easy to make, and even easier to use. What is this miraculous cure? As CNN's Anderson Cooper reports, it's a ready-to-eat, vitamin-enriched concoction called "Plumpynut," an unusual name for a food that may just be the most important advance ever to cure and prevent malnutrition.
"It's a revolution in nutritional affairs," says Dr. Milton Tectonidis, the chief nutritionist for Doctors Without Borders.
"Now we have something. It is like an essential medicine. In three weeks, we can cure a kid that is looked like they're half dead. We can cure them just like an antibiotic. It’s just, boom! It's a spectacular response," Dr. Tectonidis says.
"It's the equivalent of penicillin, you’re saying?" Cooper asks.
"For these kids, for sure," the doctor says.
No kids need it more than a group of children 60 Minutes saw in Niger, a desperately poor country in West Africa, where child malnutrition is so widespread that most mothers have watched at least one of their children die.
Why are so many kids dying? Because they can't get the milk, vitamins and minerals their young bodies need. Mothers in these villages can't produce enough milk themselves and can't afford to buy it. Even if they could, they can't store it -- there’s no electricity, so no refrigeration. Powdered milk is useless because most villagers don't have clean water. Plumpynut was designed to overcome all these obstacles.
Plumpynut is a remarkably simple concoction: it is basically made of peanut butter, powdered milk, powdered sugar, and enriched with vitamins and minerals. It tastes like a peanut butter paste. It is very sweet, and because of that kids cannot get enough of it.
The formula was developed by a nutritionist. It doesn't need refrigeration, water, or cooking; mothers simply squeeze out the paste. Many children can even feed themselves. Each serving is the equivalent of a glass of milk and a multivitamin.
To see the impact it's having, 60 Minutes drove for 12 hours from Niger's capital to a remote village, where every week Doctors Without Borders hand out Plumpynut. After sleeping in a field under mosquito nets, Cooper and the team awoke at sunrise to find mothers emerging from the fields. Many had walked for hours in the dark, along treacherous paths, avoiding scorpions, spiders and poisonous snakes.
Rivers of women flowed into the site and within minutes there were more than a thousand of them, all waiting to get packets or tubs of Plumpynut. In a land where plastic bags are a luxury, they carry the food home in their scarves, their hands, or simply stacked on top of their heads.
"When you see some of these kids they don’t look sick. They don’t look malnourished. They don’t have bloated bellies or little stick arms," Cooper remarks.
"The ones that we're used to seeing on TV, that’s the worst of the worst of the worst. It's the tip of the iceberg. And then below that, there’s the iceberg. So, there's a whole spectrum of malnutrition," Dr. Tectonidis says. "And when we go and check these kids, well, they’re way off in height or in weight. They’re way off."
Produced By Robert Anderson and Casey Morgan
© MMVIII, CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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See all 237 CommentsThank you,
John and Jean Einsmann
How can you go to bed at night and sleep when you know this is going on.
Is there No money going to this?
It would also go a long way as to how the world views us and a Nation.
It''s a disgrace for the United States along with England to live and not even try to help in this country. There is more problems over there and this would help greatly and show them we are watching and changes are coming. I''m embarrassed tonight as an American that we have done nothing. Tomorrow I''ll change that for myself and contact these doctors to at least donate money to there cause.
What a great idea! I am concerned about the long term effects of the peanut butter and sugar, but just saving the child''s life is a good start. I wonder if the adults eat this too? I too think birth control should be taught at the same time.
I think on income tax forms they should throw out the section that asks if you would like to donate to the presidential election campaign and put a worth while cause there instead. For example this one.
http://www.plumpynutinthefield.com/eng/index-eng.php
If only they had jobs in Niger. Maybe 60 minutes could do a story on how nice it would be to send the rest of America''s jobs to Niger. Or, purhapes a story on why jobs didn''t go to Niger in the first place. Or, how about a stroy on Chinese & Indian job''s going to Niger.
As a college biology student, I am well aware that this world does not have infinite resources. However, the data show that the human population is nowhere near the "carrying capacity" of the environment.
The reason we have problems with the environment is that we do not have "sustainable development". It is quite possible to invent a practical alternative fuel (e.g. butanol). We have plenty of land, at least in America, that is not being utilized for farming. If we are true stewards of the environment, the sky is the limit.
The United States of America has a much larger population than Nigeria. Why are our children not starving? Not because we treat the environment better. Nigeria is a farm country; they are not pouring out nasty pollution into the water and air. American children are healthy because we have infrastructure.
The answers to Africa''s problems are not some spiritually destructive forms of birth control. The answer to Africa''s problems is science.
HRW
I appreciate the input from ''Niameykid''. These parents want what''s best for their children, they just don''t have the opportunity to give them the best. Yes, having less children or no children could help the problem, however, let''s see you get married but never make love to your spouse. Let''s see you live in these conditions and work hard your whole life just to live on millet, and then have some uneducated prejudice person have the audacity to tell you that you''re being irresponsible. These are some of the most responsible people you will find. They work hard, they love hard, and they die hard. Who are we to judge them.
I say God bless the hands that reach out to them with love and caring. They need all the help they can get, and human compassion demands that we who have plenty give it.
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