Author: Steve Hansch

Strengthening Nutrition Action in “Field Exchange”

June 16, 2026   The latest (April 2026) edition of the “Field Exchange“ journal, by the Irish Emergency Nutrition Network, about combatting malnutrition in emergencies includes the following findings:

Relapse-inclusive costing of simplified CMAM protocols: Lessons from Mali (Original Article by Nina Firas et al.)  This non-randomized study in Gao, Mali, conducted a provider-perspective costing analysis of standard versus simplified community management of acute malnutrition (CMAM) protocols for uncomplicated severe acute malnutrition (SAM) in children aged 6–59 months, explicitly including costs of post-discharge relapses over an eight-month follow-up. Findings showed similar or slightly higher per-episode treatment costs for the simplified protocol due to longer length of stay, but substantially lower average cost per child treated when relapses were included (USD 139 vs. USD 169 for standard), driven by much lower relapse rates in the simplified arm; comorbidities strongly predicted relapse. The authors conclude that relapse-inclusive economic evaluations provide a more accurate measure of program efficiency and sustainability, and that investing in stronger post-discharge follow-up and relapse prevention yields both clinical and financial gains, even in fragile, insecure settings where pragmatic costing remains feasible and valuable.

 Keeping nutrition a priority in a constrained funding environment: A conversation with Lord Jonny Oates (Views)   Lord Jonny Oates, Chief Executive of United Against Malnutrition & Hunger, reflects on his early experiences with famine in Ethiopia that shaped his lifelong commitment to nutrition as foundational to human development, societal stability, and global security. He discusses the alliance’s efforts to rebuild UK leadership in nutrition advocacy amid aid cuts, stressing the need to link nutrition to high-priority government agendas (climate, migration, security, economic growth) and to balance immediate humanitarian response with long-term investments in food systems, health services, and climate resilience. Oates emphasizes that cutting nutrition funding is a false economy, advocates for fairer debt restructuring and innovation/research support, and advises nutrition professionals to communicate clear returns on investment while persistently aligning messages with policymakers’ priorities without giving up.

 Can artificial intelligence support infant feeding during conflict?  Lessons from Ukraine (Original Article by Olena Rozhenko et al.) In response to disrupted in-person breastfeeding support and rising misinformation during the Ukraine conflict, FHI360 implemented the Harmony of Parenthood initiative across four oblasts, integrating a closed-domain, Telegram-based AI chatbot for evidence-based IYCF-E and psychosocial support with facility-based counselling by trained health workers and a structured mentorship program. The chatbot reached over 2,000 unique users with high engagement and satisfaction (93–99% found information useful and clear), while combined services increased exclusive breastfeeding rates from 60% to 69% among mothers receiving repeated support and improved counselling quality and consistency through mentorship and feedback loops. The experience demonstrates that responsibly governed AI tools (with human oversight, pre-approved content, and clear referral pathways) can responsibly extend reach and reinforce messaging in humanitarian settings without replacing skilled human support, offering practical lessons for ethical digital innovation, content governance, and integration into national systems.

 Group relactation: Experiences from the Philippines (Original Article by Ines Avellana Fernandez et al.)  Arugaan, a women-led organization with decades of emergency experience in the typhoon-prone Philippines, supports group re-lactation in mother-baby areas during crises by helping mixed- or formula-fed mothers restart breastfeeding through culturally adapted techniques including cross-feeding (wet nursing), drip-drop feeding, full-body lactation massage, and peer support groups. Success stems from deliberately building breastfeeding self-efficacy by addressing misconceptions, educating mothers on lactation physiology (prolactin for supply and oxytocin for let-down), creating safe empowering environments, and leveraging existing cultural practices while providing practical skills and peer modelling. The approach has enabled thousands of mothers to successfully relactate, underscoring that intentional investment in community-based, gender-responsive support can protect breastfeeding as a safe, sustainable, life-saving feeding option in emergencies where formula feeding carries high risks.

 Private-public partnerships in action in India: Experiences from the Nand Ghar program (Original Article by Rohini Saran et al.)  The Nand Ghar initiative is a large-scale public-private partnership between Vedanta (through its CSR) and Indian government bodies to upgrade over 12,000 Anganwadi centers into modern “smart” centers providing enhanced early childhood development, nutrition, health, and women’s empowerment services across 17 states. It addresses systemic gaps in infrastructure, frontline capacity, service quality, dietary diversity (via nutri-gardens), and monitoring through upgraded child-friendly facilities, targeted training, digital tools/AI dashboards, community mobilization, and time-bound operational support, with government retaining ownership and scaling responsibility. Key lessons include the importance of early co-design with government, working within existing systems for legitimacy and scalability, combining infrastructure upgrades with capacity building and accountability mechanisms, and ensuring private support leads to sustainable institutionalization and community ownership rather than parallel structures.

Using Nutrition Impact and Positive Practice (NIPP) to address malnutrition: A decade of lessons (Original Article by Ellise Brennan et al.) NIPP is a grassroots, gender-responsive, positive-deviance-based approach implemented by GOAL over more than a decade in six countries that uses 12-week participatory learning circles (separate for men and women) featuring practical cooking demonstrations, micro-gardening, hygiene infrastructure, and behavior-change sessions to address underlying causes of malnutrition in households with moderate wasting or at risk. Program data from Sudan, Niger, Malawi, and Zimbabwe showed high cure rates at graduation (73–96% for children with moderate wasting) and very low relapse rates (<2% at 2–12 month follow-ups), alongside sustained improvements in dietary diversity, feeding practices, hygiene behaviors, and household food security, with the approach proving more cost-effective and sustainable than input-heavy interventions because it builds community capacity and self-reliance. NIPP has been successfully institutionalized within national systems in several countries, demonstrating its potential to complement treatment programs by reducing relapse and supporting long-term nutrition recovery through community-driven, low-input behavior change.

The nutrition emergency situation in Pakistan: A call to action (Letter by Dr Abdul Baseer Khan Achakzai)   Dr. Abdul Baseer Khan Achakzai outlines Pakistan’s severe and worsening nutrition crisis, marked by high stunting (40%), wasting (18%), underweight (29%), and anemia rates among children under five, alongside a double burden of malnutrition and limited access to services, especially in rural areas. He attributes the crisis to structural factors including low health expenditure (<2% of GDP), climate shocks (floods, droughts, heatwaves), rapid population growth, weak governance, provincial disparities, and slow operationalization of the 2022 National Public Health Nutrition Strategy amid fiscal constraints and competing priorities. The letter calls for protected nutrition budget lines, integrated multi-sectoral responses, strengthened provincial capacity, accountability mechanisms, and sustained international support aligned with SDGs and the Global Action Plan on Child Wasting, positioning Pakistan as a case study of systemic vulnerability in a climate-stressed, resource-constrained setting.

A shorter article is about policy alignment analysis of the MAMI approach in Senegal (largely aligned with national strategies but with identified gaps in maternal mental health and support for vulnerable/disabled infants),  Also included were Research Snapshots and Report Summaries cover topics such as relapse economics, WHO wasting guideline gaps, anticipatory action, and ultra-processed foods but are concise overviews rather than full articles.

 

Kenya’s Arid Lands Face Persistent Hunger Crisis Amid Mixed Projections for Late 2026

June 14, 2026     Kenya continues to face severe hunger and malnutrition in its arid and semi‑arid lands (ASAL), where drought, high food prices, and weakened pastoralist livelihoods have pushed millions into crisis. According to the U.S. Famine Early Warning System (FEWS NET), 2.5–2.99 million people currently need food assistance, with needs possibly declining to 1.5–1.99 million by December 2026 if weather conditions improve.

However, more recent field data from Action Against Hunger (ACF) and partners show a sharper picture:3.7 million people are in IPC Phase 3 (Crisis) or worse, including 400,000 in IPC Phase 4 (Emergency).  This represents a dramatic increase (a 52% jump) compared to early 2025.).

Where the Crisis Is Most Severe

Northern and northeastern counties remain the hardest hit. Nutrition assessments in early 2026 classified:

  • »  Mandera, Turkana South/East, and parts of Marsabit as Extremely Critical (IPC Acute Malnutrition Phase 5)
  • »  Garissa, Wajir, Isiolo, and Samburu as Critical (Phase 4)

These counties account for about 62% of Kenya’s total malnutrition burden.

Recent data from UNICEF, the Ministry of Health, and the National Drought Management Authority (NDMA) estimate:

  • »  810,871 children under five need treatment for wasting (up from 760,488 in 2025)
  • »  116,800 pregnant and breastfeeding women also require treatment

Malnutrition Levels Remain Alarmingly High

SMART surveys and community screenings show persistently high wasting rates:

  • »  Wajir: 14.95% GAM (2023)
  • »  Baringo/Tiaty: 21% GAM
  • »  Turkana (some areas): ~33% GAM in community screenings
  • »  Turkana (2024 SMART): GAM declined from 26.4% to 21.8%—still above the 15% emergency threshold

In several northern counties—Mandera, Turkana South/East, and North Horr—analyses in late 2025 and early 2026 indicated Extremely Critical levels, meaning wasting rates of 30% or more. As your text states, “Northern areas such as Mandera, Turkana South/East, and North Horr reportedly reached Phase 5 ‘Extremely Critical’… corresponding to a rate of wasting malnutrition of 30% or more.”

A major warning sign is the collapse in mass screening coverage, which fell from 75% of hotspots in 2023 to under 15% by August 2025 due to funding shortages. This means many children with acute malnutrition are simply not being identified.

Drivers of the Crisis

The hunger emergency is fueled by overlapping shocks:

  • »  Erratic rainfall and recurring drought
  • »  High food prices
  • »  Poor livestock‑to‑cereal terms of trade
  • »» Livestock deaths and reduced milk production
  • »  Insecurity along the Kenya–Somalia border and in parts of Turkana

These factors have eroded pastoralist livelihoods and reduced household access to food.

Refugee Camps Under Severe Strain

Kenya hosts roughly 720,000 refugees in Dadaab, Kakuma, and Kalobeyei. Food rations have been cut to 28% of standard levels, worsening malnutrition among Somali and South Sudanese refugees. Funding gaps have also caused stockouts of ready‑to‑use supplementary foods (RUSF) and therapeutic foods in several hotspot counties.

Mixed Outlook for Late 2026

FEWS NET projects that food insecurity may ease by December 2026 if rainfall and harvests improve. But high prices and the upcoming lean season mean many households will remain in IPC Phase 3 (Crisis) or worse without continued support. National‑level improvements risk masking localized Phase 4–5 emergencies in remote ASAL counties and refugee settlements.

Humanitarian Response

Several NGOs continue to deliver life‑saving assistance:

  • »  Action Against Hunger (ACF) operates across Samburu, Baringo, West Pokot, Isiolo, Tana River, Kwale, Mandera, and the refugee camps, often using UNICEF and WFP supply chains for last‑mile delivery.
  •   International Rescue Committee (IRC) leads nutrition programs in Kakuma.
  • »  Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) supports health and nutrition services in Dadaab.
  • »  World Vision, Humanity & Inclusion, Cordaid, and Kenya Red Cross work with county governments on community outreach, CMAM programs, and cash support.

These organizations coordinate through the Kenya Nutrition Cluster to address both immediate treatment needs and the underlying drivers of hunger.

Salud (Health) Everywhere, a Valuable Educational Site

June 9, 2026       Hunger Notes recommends students and practitioners to refer to and read the website “Salud Everywhere”, which is an expanding source about nutrition, humanitarian aid and health.

See:  https://saludeverywhere.com/en/health-in-humanitarian-crises/nutrition-in-humanitarian-action/

It has pages about world hunger, stunting, micronutrient deficiencies, low-birthweight and other key topics of relevance.  It provides a list of List of NotebookLMs (AI information) about humanitarian action and development cooperation.

Each page or section of the site is available both in Spanish and English languages.  It grows by the day.

The site’s author is Dr. Bruno Abarca, who also works for Action Against Hunger in Spain, and teaches Public Health in Complex Emergencies at the School of Public Health at George Washington University.

Suggestions for this site can be given here.

Book Review: The End of Violence

June 6, 2026.     Dr. Gary Slutkin, in his new book The End of Violence  (published April 21, 2026), explains his early career experience working with the Somali Refugee Health Unit, helping malnourished refugees in East Africa, which inspired him in time to apply the skills he learned to take on global outbreaks of violence, which can lead to malnutrition and famine.

An epidemiologist, Slutkin has applied the tools and lessons of disease prevention to violence across the U.S. and in other countries.  The End of Violence:  Eliminating the World’s Deadliest Epidemic (Little, Brown and Company)  sums up his insights and experiences over several decades, particularly in Chicago, Illinois, including his key insight that violence is contagious.  He writes: “Violence is often regarded as an unavoidable fact of life… [but it] enters the brain and infects people, communities, and countries via the same process as other epidemics.”

Over several decades of pioneering fieldwork, Slutkin observed that violence is not primarily a moral failing, or a political inevitability arising from poverty, or about failures of policing. 

Instead, violence is a contagious, communicable disease that alters human brain biology, spreads by person-to-person transmission, and can be contained using the standard public health epidemic playbook that he had previously used to fight TB, AIDS, and other diseases.  He notes the threat of super-spreaders, such as authoritarian leaders who abuse their platforms to mass-infect populations with violent ideologies or behaviors.

Slutkin finds that transmission is “dose dependent:”  “Children who were exposed to intermediate or high levels of violence, especially those who experienced chronic exposure, were over 3,000 percent or 31.5 times more likely to engage in chronic violent behavior than those who were exposed to no or low amounts of violence.”

Violence not only directly hurts people; it has indirect harms.  For example, when there is violence in communities, it prevents student learning and discourages teachers.

“We already have the tools to protect ourselves, heal our communities, and end violence in our lifetime. It is now up to us to use them.”

He argues that the cutting edge of public health is prevention via interaction with people to move them away from heighted risks.

Slutkin’s program trains “violence interrupters” and credible messengers (often individuals who have transformed their own lives after involvement in street violence) to identify and mediate conflicts before they turn lethal (the rough health equivalent of contact tracing and quarantine).

“To interrupt the transmission… we need to follow a new playbook, one grounded in public health… our most formidable tool to limit spreading is helping a population adopt safer behaviors…  There is no epidemic control without changes in behavior.”

Dr. Ron Waldman, who worked with him in Somalia, writes: “Slutkin has taken incredibly innovative thinking, adapted from his experiences in global health, and applied it with remarkable dedication and even more remarkable results, to one of the most enduring and destructive social problems plaguing the U.S.  This is an important book.”

His program, formerly called Ceasefire, now “Cure Violence Global” (CVG), has been replicated in hundreds of communities across 17 countries, and major cities in the United States.  These includes:

  • *  West Garfield Park, Chicago, where deaths dropped by 31.4% in the first year;
  • *  San Pedro Sula, Honduras, where shootings declined by 94%;
  • *  South Bronx, East New York, Brooklyn;
  • *  Port of Spain / Trinidad and Tobago; and
  • *  Cali, Colombia, where 30-50% of homicides were reduced.

Dr. Manuel Carballo, who has worked with him for many years, says:  “Dr Gary Slutkin’s work to prevent violence has not only reminded us of the magnitude of this global problem, but more importantly has explored the complex of factors that contribute to what he has so rightly and innovatively defined as a communicable disease. His work and his book is a game changer. It reflects a social tragedy that is all too often taken for granted or that generates responses that simply skim over the insidious character of the problem. The insights he provides should now serve as a guide for policy makers and the public at large, and hopefully will lead to new and concerted action. Dr Slutkin has pioneered a whole new public health arena and has been able to demonstrate that the incidence of violent behaviour can be effectively reduced. The implications of this for public health and human security are far-reaching.”

CVG is a nonprofit that provides training, technical assistance, assessment, capacity building, hiring support, monitoring, and ongoing guidance rather than directly running every local program. Local community-based organizations or governments usually implement the on-the-ground work (violence interrupters, outreach workers, etc.).

Slutkin writes, “We needed locals who had firsthand experience with violence.  …This was equally true in the epidemic work I did… If we wanted to reach Somali refugees, we needed to hire other Somali refugees.  If [we] wanted to help change behavior among intravenous drug users, [we] needed to hire former intravenous drug users.  People trust people they recognize themselves in, and, ideally, already know.”

In his concluding Action Plan, he recommends:  “Every city and community needs a violence-prevenion program, just as it needs police departments, fire departments, schools and health services.”

The books end-notes and “Solutions by Violence Syndrome Annex alone are worth the price of the book’s purchase.

The dominant funding source for CVG has been municipal and state government budgets, increasingly treating the program as recurring line items rather than one-off grants. Baltimore’s Safe Streets, for instance, became part of the city’s budget; NYC’s tens of millions flow through the city’s Crisis Management System; St. Louis committed multi-year city money through its Board of Aldermen.

Local health departments frequently act as the fiscal intermediary.  Private donors also make a difference, such as Bader Philanthropies, which gave $100,000 to the City of Milwaukee to implement Ceasefire.  Other funders are the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, and the MacArthur Foundation.  International work has involved the World Bank and Inter-American Development Bank.

Over the years, institutions like the Department of Justice, Johns Hopkins University, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have evaluated these interventions, frequently validating significant statistical associations between Cure Violence implementation and reduced violence rates.

The program is cost-efficient.  Costs of implementation have varied from site to site, from $80,000 for a one-year startup, to $64 million in New York City.  Societal savings of CVG are often estimated at $7–$33+ per $1 invested due to reduced medical, criminal justice, and other costs.

The strongest evidence comes from quasi-experimental evaluations: difference-in-differences, synthetic controls, interrupted time series, comparison neighborhoods, before/after analyses, and mixed-methods evaluations. The 2025 systematic review identified 13 papers, covering 27 program sites and 83 findings on shootings or killings. Overall, two thirds of findings showed reductions. Outside Baltimore, 95.8% of sites showed reductions and 54.2% reached statistical significance. Hunger Notes generated CVG’s Theory of Change diagram, shown here.

While the CVG has been effective at local gun violence at the community level the evidence is less compelling for larger systematic political violence, state violence, civil war, and international war.

The Nobel Peace Prize committee should consider Slutkin for candidacy.

See also:  TED Talk  “Let’s treat violence like a contagious disease”

See:  GarySlutkin.com

  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWjq0tlq1bs

PBS/Frontline produced a documentary about “The Interruptors”, available here.

War-Driven Fertilizer Disruptions Through the Strait of Hormuz and Their Effects on Malnutrition Risk in Vulnerable Countries

June 4, 2026    News Analysis by Rohma Akhtar

The Middle East war continues to disrupt ship traffic through the Strait of Hormuz affecting shipments of urea, sulfur and phosphates for fertilizer.  As predicted, aid agencies are reporting increases in malnutrition as a result.

As reported here, in Hunger Notes in March, fertilizer prices increased by 6.5% in February.  They increased yet another 26% in March.  Because fertilizer is central to cereal and staple food production, these shocks are raising prices of basic foods and increase trade costs, with downstream effects on food security and nutrition in vulnerable low- and middle-income countries. Child wasting, a rapid, acute form of malnutrition characterized by severe weight loss, responds within months to food access shocks, unlike chronic stunting, which can take months to years.

India, Sudan, and Ethiopia are the countries most likely to experience the largest increase in child wasting following the fertilizer shock.

The fertilizer-to-wasting pathway does not operate in isolation from other conflict effects, as the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, which is driving up fertilizer and energy prices, is also disrupting broader maritime trade routes, especially impacting humanitarian aid.

As humanitarian access is already constrained by insecurity and damaged infrastructure in Sudan and parts of Ethiopia, higher transport and logistics costs further limit agencies’ ability to pre-position food and therapeutic supplies at the scale needed.

Since fertilizer shocks take 6-12 months to fully translate into food price increases and yield losses, the impacts  are likely to peak in late 2026 and early 2027.

Ministries of health, UN agencies, and donors should pre-position therapeutic supplies, expand nutritional surveillance, and front-load assistance now rather than waiting for confi rmed increases in the prevalence of acute malnutrition to trigger a response.

–  Contributor Rohma Akhtar, is a student of George Washington University Milken School of Public Health

Ebola Lessons from 2014 for 2026

June 1, 2026     Germane to the current outbreak of Ebola Virus Disease in eastern DRC this month are lessons from the large humanitarian efforts to curtail transmission of Ebola in West Africa in 2014-2016.

The USG commissioned an evaluation of that response, which looked not only at USG response, but that of other donors, UN agencies, NGOs, academia and other actors.  The reports from that evaluation are linked below.

Four key lessons jump out from the research:

First, the aid response of separating family members with symptoms of Ebola had the unintended effect of discouraging honest reporting or referrals, such that the total official death count across West Africa was much lower than the true cause of death.

Second, what mattered the most in interrupting transmission was when local populations observed deaths of people they knew which led them to take seriously new changes in behavior (not touching the bodies of people wiht Ebola).  This was the essential change that had to occur.

Third, much of the efforts overall by aid agencies had less of an effect in “bending the curve” of the epidemic than the simple communications by the families and communities affected.

Fourth, while many health professionals died early in the outbreak, attention to protecting them, including provision of protective gowns/gloves and equipment was necessary for further work to be achieved.

Food and Nutrition:

Food aid functioned less as a nutrition intervention and more as an enabler of disease control.  Its main value was making isolation and quarantine viable. Qualitative data indicated that food distributions to isolation and treatment units, facilitated by Food for Peace (FFP), improved the effectiveness of isolation, quarantine, and  response actions at community-based sites of transmission. FFP food distribution played a critical role in supporting isolation and restrictions on mobility,  in response to warnings from implementing partners about food shortages among quarantined communities.

The scale was significant:  through the end of 2014, USAID awarded nearly $35 million in food assistance to WFP through the Office of Food for Peace.  Examples include WFP providing all patients discharged from the Guékédou treatment unit in Guinea with a 60-day food ration on leaving, and continuing general distributions of 45-day rations (rice, oil, pulses, salt) in affected communities.

 The proportion of quarantined households that received food support was roughly similar across all three countries, between 60 and 70 percent.  In Guinea, quarantined families with Ebola cases were more likely to have received food support in urban areas (89%) than in rural areas (53%),  part of a broader urban bias the evaluation flagged in how supplies were targeted. Notably, the reports treat food almost entirely as rations/in-kind support for isolation; there is essentially no analysis of nutritional outcomes per se.

Behavior change

Behavior change was identified as one of the most decisive factors in bending the epidemic curve — arguably more than clinical capacity. The most effective USG-funded activities were nationally-led incident management and coordination, social mobilization, and safe human remains management; as OFDA scaled up community engagement — health education, household isolation, hygiene kits, community outreach, adapting safe burial practices, and involving local leadership — a downward trend in new cases is clearly seen in the data.

The substance of the behavior change effort was straightforward but hard to achieve: much of the social mobilization effort was oriented toward changing simple behaviors such as shaking hands, other physical contact, washing hands, and the handling of infected persons and dead bodies. The key lesson was sequencing — which donors under-prioritized at first.  Whereas  early priorities focused on facility-based responses, case isolation, treatment, and safe burial, donors and NGOs failed to prioritize social mobilization and community-level responses.  Key lesson: social mobilization is the most relevant at the outset of the response.  Aid agencies should hire and deploy anthropologists.

When trusted local actors led it, the payoff was fast:  one Government of Guinea informant noted that within 1–2 months of accelerated social mobilization, the number of prefectures reporting social resistance dropped from 27 to 4.

A cross-cutting theme among evaluators were that while more than 90% of activity monitoring targets were reported as achieved, this reflected only activities and reveals little about actual change in bending the epidemic curve,  a major limitation in analyzing the USG contribution.

These reports, led by the independent evaluation organization IBTCI were available on the USAID Development Experience Clearinghouse until a year ago when the Administration dissoved it.  They are accessible via these links below:

 Synopsis:     https://www.worldhunger.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/Synopsis-of-Ebola-West-Africa-Evaluation.pdf

        Coordination:  https://www.worldhunger.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/Ebola-Response-Eval-4-Coordination.pdf

        Effectiveness:  https://www.worldhunger.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/ebola-ibtci-eval-effectivenes-1.pdf

         Relevance:   https://www.worldhunger.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/Ebola-evaluation-Relevance-of-response-3.pdf

        Components:   https://www.worldhunger.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/Ebola-evaluation-vol.-2-effectiveness-of-components-2018.pdf

A 2020 review of some selected lessons about the West Africa and DRC Ebola responses, largely non-medical, was commissioned by ALNAP here, focusing on community trust and messaging.

at the same time, ALNAP recommends these infection and control guidelines from WHO.

May Data Shows Food Insecurity Rising in America

May 30, 2026    Reports this week indicate an increase in food insecurity among lower-income houses with children in the United States.

On May 27, 2026, the Federal Reserve Bank of New York wrote:  “We find a remarkable increase in food insecurity, particularly among lower-educated and lower-income households and households with young children. We document a contemporaneous increase in pessimism among the same groups, along with a sharp decline in job-finding expectations.”  and:  “The greater financial strain due to the high cost of living, combined with the expiration of pandemic-era aid (such as expanded SNAP benefits), have led to renewed concerns about food insecurity among those at the bottom of the K-shape.”

The Federal Reserves’ chart at right shows how the blue data points for February 2026 show greater dip in savings, and meals missed than in prior years.

CommonDreams.org reports how:  “The New York Fed’s analysis came amid a flurry of new data showing that rising inflation, now at a three-year high, is eroding Americans’ paychecks and causing personal savings rates to plummet as households are forced to spend more on gas, food, and other basics.  …the nonprofit research group Equitable Growth pointed to “an important milestone: Household incomes are now down year-over-year. American households had more money to spend in April of 2025.”

The Food Research & Action Center on May 28, 2026 wrote “Families are skipping meals, relying on food banks, and turning to SNAP to get by. Hunger is rising and Congress cannot look away.” https://t.co/ImAFSuTJSg

In other words, tens of millions of Americans are more hungry now than in past years.

Note:  Hunger Notes previously reported:

  • * The 2023 USDA Household Food Security data showed prevalence rose from 10.5% in 2020 to 13.5% in 2023, an increase of just under 5 million households — about 47.5 million Americans.
  • *  Repeated in an August 2025 note: “About 13.5% of U.S. households or nearly 18 million families experienced food insecurity in 2023”.
  • *  January 2026 analysis noted food insecurity “has been on the rise in the U.S. for the past two decades, 17% from 2001 to 2023.”  We reported how  “In 2026, cuts in the SNAP program enacted in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, were estimated to eliminate SNAP assistance for millions of Americans, may further increase food insecurity”.

This Week’s May 28 was World Hunger Day

May 28, 2026     May 28 was World Hunger day, inspiring many to take action to reduce malnutrition.  The overarching theme for this year’s global campaign is “The End of Hunger is in Our Hands”. 

The World Hunger Day initiative was founded in 2011 by The Hunger Project, a global non-profit organization established in 1977.

While many global awareness days focus heavily on immediate crisis relief and the distribution of emergency food aid, the original intent behind establishing World Hunger Day was to shift the global narrative toward sustainability and self-reliance.  Organizations like Islamic Relief have utilized today to issue a formal warning that the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal of “Zero Hunger by 2030” is rapidly slipping out of reach due to localized aid funding cuts and war-related supply chain disruptions, particularly noting that humanitarian aid is currently meeting only a tiny fraction of the acute need in places like Somalia.

In South Africa, the day serves as the climax of a national week of mobilization organized by the Union Against Hunger (UAH), which declared May 25–30 as Food Justice Week.  International service networks, such as local Lions Clubs, are executing targeted community supply runs today, routing fresh fruits and vegetables directly to underfunded early-childhood crèches and community kitchens to combat localized child wasting and stunting.

The worst levels are concentrated in three bands:

  • * The Horn of Africa and East Africa – Somalia, South Sudan, Burundi, Ethiopia, and Sudan
  • *  Central and West Africa – Democratic Republic of Congo, Chad, Niger, Central African Republic, Nigeria, and Madagascar
  • *  Conflict hotspots outside Africa – Yemen, Afghanistan, Syria, Haiti, and North Korea.

In Haiti:  nearly 277,000 children aged 6 to 59 months are facing or expected to face acute malnutrition.  In Kenya, the number of children aged 6 to 59 months requiring treatment for malnutrition between April 2025 and March 2026 is estimated to be 741,883.  In Ethiopia,~900,000 severely wasted children under 5 are estimated, nationally.

In the United States, food banks are feeling an intense squeeze. Daily living costs are so high that even families with full-time jobs are showing up at pantries just to make it to the end of the month.

The United Nations (UN) often sees significant legislative and health policy momentum occur in tandem with the day. For instance, the UN’s World Health Assembly (the decision-making body of the World Health Organization) regularly approves key nutrition-focused resolutions regarding persistent global stunting, wasting, and anemia around late May, intentionally capitalizing on the heightened public awareness surrounding World Hunger Day.

The UN’s 2025 Hunger Hotspots report flags the same places, naming Sudan, Yemen, Afghanistan, and South Sudan as the world’s most vulnerable, with 24.6 million Sudanese facing crisis-phase food insecurity.  Global hunger actually fell to 8.2% in 2024, but Africa and western Asia saw hunger rise.

World Vision cites 673 million people in the world facing hunger.

  • Action Against Hunger focuses heavily on treating and preventing acute malnutrition, often launching corporate and public partnerships on this day to fund nutritional programs.

  • World Vision & Compassion International utilize the day to run child-focused sponsorship campaigns, highlighting the specific impacts of food scarcity on early childhood development and maternal health.

  • Student resources for learning about world hunger can be found on this site, for instance:  https://www.worldhunger.org/lesson-plans-on-hunger-and-food-insecurity/
  • and https://www.worldhunger.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/Understanding-Global-Hunger-Fact-Sheet-3-1.pdf

Opinion: School Meals to Combat Hunger

May 27, 2026    by Nadira Kabir

Rethinking Summer Break: School Meals, Hunger, and American Families

Earlier this month, I saw a news segment about public schools in Loudoun County, Virginia — a large suburban school district near Washington, D.C. — exploring the possibility of moving to a year-round academic calendar. The discussion reflected a broader debate taking place across parts of the United States as educators and policymakers continue searching for ways to address lingering COVID-19-era learning loss and the “summer slide” that can leave students academically behind when they return to school in the fall.

As I read more about the issue, I found strong opinions on both sides. Some families and educators see year-round schooling as a valuable tool that could provide greater consistency for students while also helping working parents who struggle with long summer childcare gaps. Others worry it could limit opportunities for teenagers to work summer jobs, attend camps, travel, or simply experience a traditional summer break.

But there is another question that deserves far more attention: What would a year-round school calendar mean for hunger in America?

For millions of children in the United States, school is not just a place for learning. It is also where they receive some of the most reliable and nutritious meals of their day. Nearly 30 million children participate in federally funded school breakfast and lunch programs during the academic year. Depending on the school district, students may receive breakfasts such as cereal, fruit, yogurt, eggs, or milk, while lunches often include sandwiches, pasta, rice dishes, vegetables, fruit, and protein options designed to meet federal nutrition standards.

When schools close for summer vacation, many families suddenly face a sharp increase in grocery expenses. During the summer months, parents are responsible for providing additional meals each day while also managing higher childcare costs. Many families quietly describe summer as one of the hardest financial stretches of the year, especially as food prices continue to rise across the country.

Government-funded summer meal programs do exist and play a critical role, but access can be inconsistent. In 2024, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Summer Food Service Program reached 2.8 million children at approximately 36,000 meal sites nationwide — far fewer than the number of students served during the regular school year. Transportation barriers limited operating hours, lack of nearby meal sites, and the expiration of some pandemic-era flexibilities have all reduced participation for many families.

That is why newer initiatives like Summer EBT (Electronic Benefit Transfer), also known as SUN Bucks, are so important. Created as a permanent federal program in 2024 after being piloted during the COVID-19 pandemic, SUN Bucks provides eligible families with grocery assistance during the summer months when school meals are unavailable. The U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates that 21 million children could benefit from the program, which provides families approximately $120 per child over the summer to help purchase food. Research has shown these programs can reduce child hunger, improve diet quality, and help stabilize household budgets during one of the most financially difficult periods of the year.

This conversation is also unfolding at a time when policymakers are increasingly recognizing schools as an essential part of America’s broader nutrition safety net. In recent years, several U.S. states have expanded access to universal free school meals, while the federal government has strengthened summer nutrition programs introduced during the pandemic. Rising concern about inflation, childhood food insecurity, and family economic stress has pushed school meal policy more prominently into national discussions about public health and poverty reduction.

A more balanced year-round school calendar could potentially reduce the long gaps during which children lose access to dependable meals. It could also provide additional stability for working parents, reduce learning disruption, improve student routines, and lessen periods of heightened food insecurity that many families quietly experience each summer.

The debate over year-round schooling should not focus solely on academics or childcare. It should also include food security, child well-being, and the growing role schools play as part of the nation’s social safety net.

If designed thoughtfully, changes to school calendars could become one important part of a broader strategy to reduce childhood hunger, support working families, and strengthen child well-being in the United States.

In Memoriam: Nick Haan of the Integrated Phase Classification System

May 26, 2026      Nicholas Haan, one of the innovative leaders in food security and humanitarian action passed away on December 2, 2025.  He dedicated his life to combating global hunger and strengthening food security systems in crisis zones.

He was a co-founder of the international humanitarian NGO, Field Ready, which publishes its memory of him here.    In it, co-founder Eric James says “We bonded over our passion for improving the hardest places and our frustration with things not working better.”

Raised in California, he earned his Bachelor of Science in Genetics from U.C. Berkeley, and went on to earn a Ph.D. in Geography, a Master’s in Development Economics/International Development, and a Master’s in GIS & Remote Sensing, all from Clark University.

His deep international perspective began as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Kenya, where he taught science in a remote village and became fluent in Swahili.  He made history alongside his kayaking partner as the first person to paddle the entire lengths of both Lake Victoria (a 500 km expedition) and Lake Turkana.

Over more than three decades, Nick specialized in food security, developing groundbreaking approaches that combined data analytics, geographic information systems, and supply-chain resilience to prevent famine. He is celebrated globally as the creator of the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) System. What began as a localized data solution to map crises in Somalia is now the undisputed international standard led by the FAO, guiding billions of dollars in emergency funding across more than 30 countries

Later in his career, he was a faculty Fellow at Singularity University in Silicon Valley and previously the Vice President and Faculty Chair of Impact.

He authored influential papers and two books on adaptive food systems in fragile states. His innovative “anticipatory aid” model, delivering support before crises peak, is now considered a standard in the field.  See: this publication about information systems for food resilience.

He is one of the creators of the international standard for classifying the severity of food insecurity, the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) System which started in Somalia, and is led by FAO.  He was the lead technical advisor to the UN’s Joint Interagency Analysis Framework (JIAF), which provides essential information to allocate over $50 Billion per year in humanitarian aid. Nicholas has been one of the 5 members of the global Famine Review Committee, which makes the independent determination as to whether a place is officially classified as being in ‘Famine’.  A year ago, Nick wrote about the IPC on Linked-in:

“The Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) is celebrating its 20th anniversary of informing decisions to end hunger. Thank you to the countless people who contributed to the IPC’s technical development, believed in it, and supported it–especially in the very early days when it was just “a crazy idea”. Here are just a few of those idea-stage contributors from 20 years ago: Cindy Holleman, Thomas Gabrielle, Noreen Prendiville, Yusuf Mohamed, Ali Duale, Mark Smulders, Wolfgang Herbinger, Mohamed Aw-Dahir, Sidow Addouand, and Luca Alinovi. Thank you to all the thousands of IPC practitioners around the world, all the IPC Global Partner Agencies, and the IPC technical development experts who continue to evolve the IPC. Ending hunger requires a collective effort. It’s doable.”

A video of his explaining the IPC system is available at:  https://youtu.be/BKELLoj_41g

He is survived by his wife Mariam, and siblings Mary Catherine and Annie. Beyond his professional achievements, Nick was known for his deep humility, dry wit, and a boundless spirit of adventure.

See:  https://www.fieldready.org/post/nick-haan-in-memoriam

and an obituary at Devex: