Drought, flooding in Haiti leading to increase in malnutrition, U.N. report says

"A growing number of people in Haiti do not have enough to eat, according to the United Nations relief wing, mostly as a result of drought and the impact of recent tropical storms," the U.N. News Centre reports (4/3). The Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs "said in its monthly bulletin that a spike in malnutrition has been recorded in some areas since October," the Associated Press/Washington Post writes, adding, "At least one in five households faces a serious food deficit and acute malnutrition despite efforts to reduce hunger, the study said." According to the AP, "Widespread flooding damaged crops in the country's south when Hurricane Sandy and Tropical Storm Isaac brushed Haiti last year" (4/2).

"U.N. agencies and humanitarian organizations are working with the government to reach hundreds of thousands of people with food assistance," U.N. spokesperson Eduardo del Buey said on Tuesday at a news conference in New York, the U.N. News Centre notes. "Haiti has been re-building since the earthquake that struck in early January 2010, killing some 220,000 people and making 1.5 million others homeless, in addition to causing widespread destruction -- particularly in the capital, Port-au-Prince -- and a major humanitarian crisis," the news service writes (4/3).