Steve has been working with Plan International for the last number of months, advising on strategy to deal with the famine in Sudan. He has just returned from providing support and advice on the ground there. It was around 40 years ago that he started his work on treating starvation – actually in Sudan – in the so called Band Aid era. This latest crisis is as bad as ever, with tens of millions of people are already suffering famine or on the brink of famine. 
 

The humanitarian aid operation has a huge funding shortfall.  This means that the specialised RUTF to treat malnutrition is in very short supply and wholly insufficient to meet the levels of need – which are escalating daily. 

This brings the choice by the WHO around whether or not to unequivocally accept lower cost plant-based RUTF (that UNICEF confirm is about 25% lower cost than the standard recipe) into stark focus.  Randomised controlled trials and real-world operational programmes have already demonstrated that soy maize and sorghum RUTF is just as effective as the current peanut and milk-based recipe.

Fully approving and actively facilitating proven plant-based RUTF would allow 25% more starving children to be treated with no additional product cost.  As the treatment infrastructures are already set up, there would actually be almost no additional total cost.  Or, do those in a position to  act continue to listen to vested interests and restrict proven plant-based RUTF recipes, despite the desperate need and evidence supporting use? Surely there is no real choice here and we strongly urge those responsible in the respective UN agencies to act.