Guidance
Guideline on Wasting
The WHO Guideline for the prevention and management of wasting and nutritional oedema
One essential element of the Global Action Plan on Child Wasting is to update and develop normative guidance to support governments on the prevention and management of wasting and nutritional oedema (acute malnutrition) in all contexts.
The World Health Organization (WHO) is the lead agency at a global, regional and national level to update this normative guidance. The WHO guideline (the 'what'), which includes evidence-based recommendations and good practice statements, will be accompanied by operational guidance (the "how to") with documents and tools for implementation.
What is new in the guideline?
The WHO guideline for the prevention and management of wasting and nutritional oedema (acute malnutrition) is divided into 4 sections:
- Management of infants less than 6 months of age at risk of poor growth and development
- Management of infants and children 6-59 months with wasting and/or nutritional oedema
- Post-exit interventions after recovery from wasting and/or nutritional oedema
- Prevention of wasting and/or nutritional oedema
This is the first WHO guideline focusing on prevention and management of wasting and nutritional oedema. It highlights the vital importance of investing in both of these aspects to truly have an impact on reducing prevalence and negative impacts of wasting and nutritional oedema on children and their families throughout the world.
Briefing notes and resources
An accompanying Briefing summarizing the recommendations and main messages from the guideline.
A supplementary Briefing Note to better understand how the new WHO recommendations relate to the package of interventions known as "Simplified Approaches"
The recording of the global webinar hosted by the Global Nutrition Cluster on the management section of the guideline.
The recording of the guideline launch Event co-sponsored by FCDO and ICAN UK as part of the UK’s Global Food Security Summit.
UNICEF-WHO Technical Advisory Group (TAG) for Child Wasting
Reflecting commitments under the UN Global Action Plan on Child Wasting (GAP), WHO and UNICEF have established a partnership to collaborate on:
a. Prevention, early detection and management of wasting and nutritional oedema in children by providing more up-to-date global normative and operational guidance,
b. Support to national governments in adapting their national guidelines, and
c. Coordination of the wasting-related research agenda.
To assist in these efforts, an official UNICEF-WHO Technical Advisory Group (TAG) on Wasting and Nutritional Oedema (Acute Malnutrition) has been formed after an open call and a selection process to ensure representation predominantly of national governments, organisations as well as civil society organisations and the research community. The TAG is a multidisciplinary group of experts and key stakeholders with the goal of advising UNICEF and WHO on a broad range of topics and issues related to acute malnutrition to improve the delivery of care and preventative interventions for malnourished children and their families. Attention was also paid to ensure a balanced geographic, gender and experience/skills representation amongst the membership. This TAG will be jointly coordinated by UNICEF and WHO.
