Nutrition survey finds unprecedented level of child malnutrition in part of Sudan’s North Darfur

NEW YORK (December 29, 2025) - New data from UNICEF’s latest SMART* survey in Um Baru locality, in Sudan’s North Darfur, reveals that more than half of children assessed were acutely malnourished, with one in six suffering from severe acute malnutrition, a life-threatening condition that can kill a child in weeks if left untreated.

The nutrition survey, conducted between 19 and 23 December and screening almost 500 children, found a Global Acute Malnutrition (GAM) rate of 53 percent, with 18 percent of children suffering from Severe Acute Malnutrition (SAM) and 35 percent from Moderate Acute Malnutrition (MAM), among the highest malnutrition rates recorded in a standardized nutrition survey anywhere in the world, and more than three times the World Health Organization (WHO) emergency threshold of fifteen percent.

“When severe acute malnutrition reaches this level, time becomes the most critical factor,” said UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell. “Children in Um Baru are fighting for their lives and need immediate help. Every day without safe and unhindered access increases the risk of children growing weaker and more death and suffering from causes that are entirely preventable.”

The crude mortality rate has reached emergency levels, underscoring the immediate and deadly risk facing children.

Many residents of the locality are recently internally displaced families who fled the sharp escalation of fighting in Al Fasher in late October.  Many of the children among them have not been immunized against measles or other vaccine preventable diseases, making them particularly vulnerable.

The crisis is unfolding amid escalating insecurity that has severely restricted humanitarian access and delayed life-saving assistance. Continued fighting in the area is creating deadly delays in the scale-up of urgently needed humanitarian services.

North Darfur remains at the epicenter of Sudan’s malnutrition crisis, with nearly 85,000 severely malnourished children admitted for treatment in the state by November this year alone. UNICEF has prepositioned life-saving supplies such as Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food (RUTF), but holistic health and nutrition services are urgently needed, given the scale of the emergency.

UNICEF calls upon all parties to allow immediate, safe, and unhindered humanitarian access to ensure life-saving assistance can reach children and their families trapped by the conflict. Without a predictable and respected humanitarian pause in fighting, aid workers cannot safely deliver food, clean water, medical care, or protection services, and children continue to pay the highest price. The international community, including states that have influence over the parties to the conflict, must urgently intensify diplomatic and political pressure to ensure a humanitarian pause is agreed to, respected, and implemented.

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Notes for editors:

* The Standardized Monitoring and Assessment of Relief and Transitions surveys (known as SMART surveys) are a method for assessing the nutritional status of a population, particularly in emergency contexts.

• The data collection was shortened by one day due to escalating insecurity, but minimum SMART requirements were met, and data quality was assessed as strong.
   
• The survey found a Global Acute Malnutrition (GAM) rate of 53 percent, which is more than three times the WHO emergency threshold.
   
• Children under five accounted for 26 percent of household members, far above the estimated 17 percent, indicating a significant influx and absorption of internally displaced families, likely following recent conflict escalation and population movements.
   
• One in three children had been ill in the two weeks before the survey, mainly with fever, cough or diarrhea, pointing to severely constrained access to health services. Measles vaccination coverage stood at 24 percent, and Vitamin A coverage at 11 percent.

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For more information please contact:

Jenna Buraczenski, UNICEF USA, (917) 720-1432, jburaczenski@unicefusa.org