Aseel Child Relief Grand Challenge

The humanitarian crisis in Afghanistan continues to escalate with conflicts and political shifts in the country, pushing 24.4 million people into poverty and endangering the lives of 12.9 million children. Food scarcity and insufficient access to health services have caused acute malnutrition in 3.2 million children. Currently, 1.1 million children are on the cusp of severe acute malnutrition, life-threatening without treatment.

ASEEL's Emergency Response was launched in August 2021 to support war-affected people in Afghanistan. Since then, ASEEL has provided life-saving aid to more than 67,000 individuals through emergency response packages and independently-run campaigns. We are now furthering that mission by initiating the Child Relief Grand Challenge across Afghanistan. Funds will support the prevention and treatment of Moderate Acute Malnutrition (MAM) and Severe Acute Malnutrition (SAM) by providing emergency support packages to children under age five in need. The first Grand Challenge target is to provide relief for 15,000 malnourished children by providing food packages and connecting them with local and international malnutrition experts for treatment.

The Grand Challenge joins global voices in support of the children of Afghanistan. Let's raise awareness about these catastrophic conditions and raise funds to save Afghan children's lives. Currently, ASEEL is running five active campaigns. We call upon everyone to support this humanitarian initiative by donating and sharing.

Intervention

The leading food and nutrition interventions in emergency settings include rations of general food distribution (GFD) and Ready-To-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF). Due to the lack of RUTFs, lipid-based supplements, and fortified options, the food package design ASEEL provides is consistent with items that approximate the nutrition and energy requirements of a well-balanced diet the recipient population needs. Also factored in with the design of the packages are the dietary considerations, environmental conditions, familiarity with a food item, storage specifications, and preparation methods.

Emergency Child Relief Package Contents

Flour: 25 kg

Rice: 4 kg

Daal: 4 kg

Beans: 4 kg

Sugar: 4 kg

Green Tea: 1 Kg

Cooking Oil: 5 liters

Baby Formula Milk: 1

Baby Diapers: 60 Pcs

Baby Cerelacs: 1 Small Box

Medical Technical Experts

Dr. Naqib Virginia, US

Dr. Naqib is the primary lecturer of Doctoral Public Health Leadership for Health Equity and the Management of Global Public Health Emergencies as an executive board member of EDRA. In addition, he was the Senior Emergency Coordinator as part of the Global Emergency Response Team, responding to emergencies in their onset and ensuring coordination and scale-up of UNICEF supported programs.

Dr. Rabia Maryland, US

Dr.Rabia is a medical doctor with a master’s degree in public health from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. Her area of focus is Biostatistics and Epidemiology, with a Maternal and Child Health certificate from Johns Hopkins University. Currently, she works as an associate researcher at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

Dr. Tawheedullah Kabul, Afghanistan

Dr. Tawheedullah’s extensive education includes the following training and certifications: Medical Technology (MT), Doctor of Medicine (MD), Postgraduate Medical Degree (RMP, PGD), and a Diploma in Child Health (DCH). He has experience as a pediatrician working for Salaam Hospital and JMC Hospital and three years of experience in university teaching. In addition, he holds an MSF (ITFC Nutrition Specialist) that equips him to assess malnutrition while adhering to nutrition protocols and guidelines.

Dr. Uzra Bamyan, Afghanistan

Dr. Uzra Yaqubi holds a bachelor of Midwifery with more than six years’ experience improving maternal and infant well-being. While working as a nutritionist at Bamyan Regional Hospital and Baran NGO, she carefully assessed and planned diets based on individual nutritional needs crafting her expertise in the field of child nutrition.

Monitoring

1. 1. Assess endpoint measures (MUAC 11.5 Cm)
2. 2. The targeting of certain geographical locations, populations, and quality of food aid
3. 3. The objectives of the GFD are achievable and realistic.

Methods

Step 1: Identification

stage the team is going to identify the first province and scale down to further identification of the districts and villages. In addition, the team will identify healthcare centers at an equal distance to maximize coverage areas.

Step 2: Coordination and Supply

Coordination with the health centers.

• Supply them with food packages. Triage of eligible children by health care worker (up to the discretion of the health worker caring for the patient)
• MUAC: Maybe the “best” predictor of mortality in children at risk (MUAC of 115 mm).
• Visual Screening for Nutritional Assessment and correlated health complications.

Transparency & Accountability

All the participants in the ASEEL Child Relief including the technical contributors (doctors), the campaign owners, partner organizations, the shops, and the volunteers are provided with bi-weekly financial updates on where we stand and what we have distributed so far; the records of the financial data from every report will be made available to the public in a real-time basis.

For universal transparency throughout the platform and for us to be able to track every single dollar throughout the platform. The ASEEL Emergency Response (ER) team in its currently developed version (v1.0) which is providing Omid (Hope) IDs using the Omid card to every single beneficiary. The Omid IDs are pre-registered as soon as a beneficiary is identified using this form.

The second version (ASEEL ER V2.0) is being developed by the ASEEL team that has 2 additional modules of certified vendors (vendor module), these are local supermarkets in the community that provide the ASEEL Packages at the last mile. In addition, pre-approved volunteers using the (Lifesavers Module) enables the Afghan Youth to use the platform to register beneficiaries at the local level and provide lifesaving assistance to them at the district level.