East Nusa Tenggara children dying
JAKARTA (JP): Thousands of children in Indonesia's poorest province of East Nusa Tenggara are severely undernourished with deaths also being reported, Antara said on Monday.
East Nusa Tenggara Vice Governor Pake Pani said in Kupang that in March 1999, a total of 7,202 children in the province were recorded as suffering malnutrition. He said medical intervention had reduced the number to some 4,000 children, but at least 11 of the children had died.
Pani cited reports from various hospitals, including DR W.Z. Yohanes Hospital in Kupang which had treated 39 malnourished children up to June. Five of the children died at the hospital.
In another instance, the Alor Hospital in Kalabahi treated two malnourished children, who later died as a result of complications resulting from tropical malaria and respiratory tract infections.
In East Flores regency, seven children were treated at the Larantuka Hospital, but one child who was released from the hospital later died at home, because his parents could not afford to feed him. In Sikka regency, one of 30 children treated at the T.C. Hiller also died.
Separately, in Jakarta, State Minister of Population Ida Bagus Oka said in a hearing with the House Commission VI on health, social affairs and family planning that more families were now living in poverty as a result of the two-year economic crisis.
He told Antara that a survey held between January and March revealed the existence of 45,145,648 families in Indonesia. Some 23.2 percent, or 10,740,149 families, were classified as impoverished.
He said many families were unable to purchase medications and contraceptives, while the government's ability to subsidize contraceptives was also reduced.
"At the moment, two-thirds of the provision of contraceptives is paid for with the assistance of international donors or foreign loans."
He said East Nusa Tenggara had 60.8 percent of poor families, followed by Irian Jaya with 52.5 percent, East Timor with 51.8 percent and Central Java with 40.2 percent.
Oka expressed fears that the poor would increase in number as a result of a baby boom fueled by a lack of contraceptives.
Meanwhile, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has announced a US$50 million expansion in Indonesian relief efforts to help the urban poor cope with the crippling economic crisis.
In a media release, the organization said it had increased its emergency operation to include five of the neediest major cities in Java. The extended program will run from July 1 through June 2000 and feed 1.7 million people at a cost of $135.8 million, up from $88 million.
"The economic crisis has seriously undermined food security in Indonesia," said deputy country director Thomas Keusters. "There has been a perceptible increase in malnutrition among women and children because the families have almost no money to buy food."
Urban children are paying perhaps the heaviest price for the economic collapse, because many parents are pulling them out of school to send them to work in order to supplement the family income, Keusters said.
The WFP operation will consist of a variety of "food for work" projects because they address the needs of the hungry poor most directly. Other assistance will include nutritional supplements for pregnant women, rice rations for female-headed households, and orphanages and shelters for street children.
In Semarang, the capital of Central Java, Minister of Health F.A. Moeloek said on Sunday the maternal mortality rate here had dropped from 540 per 100,000 live births in 1986 to 390 per 100,000 live births.
"The rate, however, is still too high," Moeloek said after officiating at a meeting of obstetricians and gynecologists. He pointed out that Singapore's maternal mortality rate is 10, Thailand's 50, Malaysia's 59 and the Philippines 100 per 100,000 live births.(swe/har)