What Is Ready-to-Use Therapeutic Food?

Malnutrition is a silent threat to millions of children. The damage it does can be irreversible, preventing children from reaching their full potential — mentally and physically.

In its worst form, severe malnutrition can be deadly.

The day Prosper rushed his 3-year-old son, Pierre, to the nearest health center, he wondered if he would survive.

Pierre weighed just under 20 pounds and he had severe diarrhea. During the 7-mile walk from their village to the capital of the Central African Republic, Prosper prayed: "I wondered if God's plan was to take him back."

Pierre's mother had died shortly after he was born. With no job in a country ripped apart by conflict, Prosper was struggling to provide for his family, collecting corn from the dwindling supplies at a nearby farm. As Pierre’s weight steadily dropped and he grew sicker, refusing to eat, Prosper looked to traditional medicine to help his son, thinking he couldn't afford hospital care.

The situation is all too common in CAR and in many other countries and across regions where UNICEF works. Severe drought, armed conflict, disease outbreaks and other crises have resulted in persistently high rates of child malnutrition around the world.

Children who suffer from severe acute malnutrition (SAM) — also known as severe wasting, the most extreme and visible form of undernutrition — can be fatal if untreated. Those who survive often suffer long-term effects.

UNICEF and partners use ready-to-use therapeutic food (RUTF), a nutrient-packed peanut paste, to treat children with SAM. As the global leader in RUTF procurement, UNICEF purchases and distributes an estimated 75 to 80 percent of the world's supply — reaching millions of children in dozens of countries every year.

UNICEF also works with manufacturers to ensure the product's ready availability and to keep prices down. 

"For millions of children every year," UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell notes, "these sachets... are the difference between life and death."

Shelf stable, easy to administer

RUTF doesn't require refrigeration. It requires no mixing with potentially contaminated water, and stays fresh for up to two years.

Each RUTF packet comes ready to use and is easy for a parent or other caregiver to administer, no training required. One carton of ready-to-use therapeutic food contains 150 packets, enough for one six- to eight-week course of treatment to restore the health of a severely malnourished child.

After 10 days at Bangui Pediatric Hospital, Pierre was able to return home. After a month in the outpatient feeding program, where he remained on a regimen of RUTF, he was smiling and laughing again. 

RUTF saves lives. See how it is made:

Younas' story

When 10-month-old Younas was brought to a UNICEF-supported clinic in South Punjab, Pakistan, by his mother, he was weak and losing weight each day. Instead of learning to crawl or take his first steps, he mostly cried and slept. His mother told health workers that she was breastfeeding Younas and giving him buffalo milk, but he kept getting diarrhea.

The diagnosis was quick and effective. Younas was suffering from SAM, a major health issue for both children and their mothers in rural Pakistan.

After seven weeks on a diet of therapeutic food, Younas began to recover. And thanks to the health and nutrition training his mother received at the clinic, she knew what he needed to continue growing healthy and strong.

In addition to providing the lifesaving treatment for children with SAM, UNICEF also provides counseling to caregivers on best feeding practices for infants and young children and works with partners to improve access to safe water and primary health care services.

Climate change and other drivers of child malnutrition

Child malnutrition is linked to household poverty, food insecurity and disruptions in essential nutrition services in already vulnerable communities. Other contributing factors noted in UNICEF's Nutrition Strategy for 2020-2030:

• Globalization and urbanization have changed food availability, food environments and food practices. Millions of families have left the countryside and moved to cities, leaving behind traditional diets for processed foods that are frequently high in salt, sugar and fat, and low in essential nutrients and fiber.
• Women are increasingly joining the formal workforce and many of them receive little or no support from families, employers or society to help balance work responsibilities with their persistent role as primary caregivers in charge of feeding the children.
• Socio-economic inequities are increasing in most parts of the world, and many families are changing the way they eat or feed their children because of poverty and the rising cost of good diets.
• Climate change, the loss of biodiversity, damage to water, air and soil, and the increasing number, duration and complexity of health epidemics and humanitarian crises all pose critical challenges to feeding children sustainably today and for generations to come.

Child Nutrition Fund: a mission to reshape global financial support for malnutrition prevention and treatment

To accelerate action and increase impact for malnourished children, UNICEF created the Child Nutrition Fund — a joint effort backed by many partners committed to scaling up sustainable nutrition policies, programs and supplies, including RUTF.

Aligned with the Global Action Plan on Child Wasting, the CNF aims to forge collaborations among countries, donors, partners and civil society organizations that empower national governments to lead the charge. Learn more.

Related: Malnourished Children: How UNICEF Fights Child Hunger

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