Reporting by Mohamed Yasser
EASTERN GHOUTA (Eqtsad)- In not very far days, Abu Khalid remembers the harshest days of blockade, but this time with his twins Judi and Taj. Their main food was not available after regime forces centralized in the besieged Eastern Ghouta suburbs have been preventing the entrance of baby milk.
What will Abu Khalid say to his two daughters when they are drained by hunger? Can he find alternatives to stop their suffering, the children who did not taste the bitterness nor sweetness of life yet?
Abu Khalid says, “the bad nutrition for the mother due to siege in addition to bad psychological state led to drought of the mother’s milk and hence we had to restore to manufactured milk and not cow milk which might harm their health since it has fat in it.”
Because baby milk was not available in the market or if it is, it would be very expensive, Abu Khalid tries very hard to buy one or two baby milk cans every week. Price of one can reached nearly 39000 SP. One can is only enough for three days for his two daughters. That way he spends 39000 SP per month and this number is more than half of his income, according to him.
Abu Khalid adds that he restores to cooking healthy light food like cooked rice or corn to use it as nutrition in addition to baby milk which he can only buy some of.
Infants who need baby milk in Eastern Ghouta are estimated to be around 19000 children according to data obtained by Eqtsad website which they obtained by Relief Work Coordination Management in Eastern Ghouta. The numbers are distributed according to age groups in the following graphic:
Consequently, there is an urgent need to secure more than 12000 baby milk cans every week to cover the needs of children and there is not much available in Ghouta.
To address the biggest economic effects resulting from this tragedy, more than quarter of Ghouta residents pay more than half of their income to buy baby milk. If the father in the family has an infant, he is forced to pay around 45% of his income to secure milk for his child (in addition to other expenses like diapers and medications and others). Some organizations working under umbrella of Relief Work Coordination in Eastern Ghouta work to secure baby milk for free on the most vulnerable families.
Abu Yaseen, an administrative staff in coordination managements, says they were able to gather most of the relief organizations in Ghouta in one body called, “the Central Committee to Organize Milk Project”. The committee aims to coordinate between organizations which distribute milk cans and share data to deliver the material to the biggest number of people. The father in the family fills a form for the child and provides a medical report for the child in order to obtain a special card to receive milk cans on weekly basis.
The committee officials say they try their best to provide main nutrition for the innocent babies who do not have the energy to endure hunger.
Coordination management has released an exceptional report on October 25 to alarm for the danger regarding securing milk for babies. Eqtsad reporter was able to obtain a copy of the report.
To shed light on the medical consequences, we met with doctor Abu Salem, one of the doctors working in the Unified Medical Office for Douma city. He confirmed that breastfeeding is very important for the child in two ways: it is better for the child’s immunity because it strengthen immunity against most of illnesses in addition to growth. It is known that brain development for children who are dependent on breastfeeding is better than others. Second, psychologically speaking, breastfeeding strengthens the emotional bond between the mother and the child. Unfortunately, mothers complain about losing their milk because of fear of bombing and at least their milk is lacking. This has resulted in lack of growth and malnutrition cases for most of children and it is supposed to be replaced with baby milk which is not available in the first place.
When we asked about the alternatives that can be used, Abu Salem said, we normally restore to milk cooked with corn starch and not grains and this is after the infant is two months old as a nutrition supporting milk.
It should be mentioned that in the past few days with the entrance of UN aid convoy to cities and towns in Eastern Ghouta, the regime forces prevented completely the entrance of baby milk to most cities except the towns which already received the milk which can provide for 20% of the children only.
In this bitter reality, it seems that regime forces want to launch its war even on infants who has not fault except that they were born in areas which oppose the regime and they pay a very expensive bill that might lead to their death in some cases.
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