How your last hour of pay will help people like Marie

Marie*, a 28-year-old mother of three from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), faced a situation that no parent should have to encounter when she was told that her youngest baby was seriously ill.

Having been forced to leave her home village when fighting broke out, Marie and her family would walk for miles and miles to find safety.

"We had fled the war in Muheto and decided to settle here, my family and I. It was broad daylight, and we walked for five hours to reach Buguri,” Marie tells us from her new home in Masisi territory, located within the North Kivu Province of the DRC.

The family would find refuge with a host family and were welcomed into their new community, but then Marie's daughter Celéstin* became sick.

Celéstin had started to show signs of malaria, a flu-like disease that can become fatal if left untreated. 

When her mother brought her to the Bugiri health centre, Maria was told that her baby girl was also suffering from malnutrition. 

“I was really surprised and worried when I was told that my daughter was malnourished. I couldn’t imagine it,” explains Marie.

They were, however, in the right place for Celéstin to get better.

The Bugiri health centre is supported by Première Urgence Internationale (PUI) through the EAST programme, and this means that people can receive free care at the clinic.

Celéstin has been receiving free treatment and nutritional supplements from the health centre. Meanwhile, Marie has been regularly attending cooking workshops organised by the programme, where she is improving her skills in nutrition and child care.

“I realised that it was the lack of vitamins and proper hygiene that made my daughter ill. It is difficult for us to find nutritious food for the children. Sometimes, we rely on small day-to-day jobs to earn enough to eat,” she explains.

Marie was, understandably, extremely anxious about the health of her youngest child. Celéstin, however, is on the road to recovery.

“I was very worried at first, but now my daughter is healthy,” concludes Marie.

Ready-to-use therapeutic food (RUTF) has been a game changer in terms of how we support malnourished children around the world.

This is a simple sachet that includes nutrient-rich that requires no cooking, no fresh water and no electricity.

One sachet of Plumpy'nut includes vitamins and minerals, whey protein, sugar, vegetable oil and milk powder. A single portion contains 500 calories and can be given to children aged six months or older. 

A staggering 90% of children treated with RUTF survive and thrive, and we are committed to getting it to any child that needs it. 

More than 8 million people in eastern DRC are acutely food insecure, and the EAST programme - which stands for Enabling Affected Communities to Survive and Thrive - has been led by Concern since December 2023.

Improving household nutrition is one of the core aims of the initiative.

The approach includes training community health volunteers, health committees and women leaders. Concern and its partners ensure the supply of nutritional inputs and essential medicines for nutrition and integrated management of childhood illness to health centres in the parts of the DRC in which we operate. 

The partners are also providing pre- and post-natal consultations and deliveries accompanied by essential health kits.

Your support is key to funding programmes such as the EAST approach, and means that many more children like Celéstin can get the support they need before it's too late.

*Names have been changed.