ANGARA HOLDS MEDICAL MISSION IN MANILA

To combat malnutrition, Senator Edgardo J. Angara today reiterated the need for the feeding program in schools to be complemented by vitamin supplements, medicines, and medical checkups to children, including their parents and even senior citizens.

Malnutrition in our country dramatizes the miserable state investments on human capital, said Angara at the medical mission in Moises Salvador Elementary School, Manila.

The medical mission provided blood-pressure reading and free medical consultation from doctors. They gave out vitamin supplements, pain killers, anti-biotics, and cough and colds medicine, among others.

Angara noted that malnutrition cuts across all island groupings particularly Western and Eastern Visayas, Southern and Central Mindanao, Bicol Region and even parts of the National Capital Region.

He said that the malnutrition problem has brutal and irreparable effects on children and is one of the country's biggest tragedies.

Angara also said that 30 percent of children below five years old are stunted or too short for ones age. He also said that six percent has been classified as wasted or dangerously thin.

He suggested a 100-million-peso budget allocation to institutionalize School Feeding Program that could provide public elementary schools with fresh milk, vitamin supplements, fortified snacks and foods high in carbohydrates.

Angara has been calling for a genuine school feeding program where school children are given foods rich in carbohydrates, protein and calcium for the duration of a recommended period.

He has been undertaking such a school feeding program where provisions of milk, noodles and egg are given to pupils from Grade 1 to 3 on a 120-day feeding cycle. He stressed that these children, aged 7-9, are in their most important mental and physical development stage. The childrens significant improvements in height and weight, as well as attendance and academic performance, are recorded during and after the school feeding program.

To date, over 24,000 pupils from the NCR and provincial schools in Abra, Aurora, Benguet, Ilocos Norte and Iloilo have benefited from the Angara SFP program. The program saw great improvements in attendance, learning capabilities, academic performance, overall nutritional status, and the reduction of drop-out rates among beneficiaries.