The fight against childhood malnutrition continues in the municipalities of Tecpán and Comalapa. In the community of Xecoxol improved cookstoves are being installed not only to save firewood but also so that families, especially pregnant women and children in their first months of life, don’t breathe in smoke that negatively affects their health.
Just as with basic sanitation, the smoke from open fire or inadequate stoves used for cooking increases the risk of developing respiratory and ocular illnesses. As we know, in rural communities, access to gas for cooking is practically nonexistent and electricity too expensive, for this reason, the principal source of energy for cooking continues to be wood. Respiratory illnesses cause children to dedicate the energy they obtain from food to recovering and not to the adequate development of their bodies which also contributes to chronic malnutrition. ABPD supports families that participate in the chronic childhood malnutrition program with stoves that reduce the consumption of wood and the risk of burning oneself by accident, as well as expelling all the smoke outside of the home, in order to improve the health of the entire family.
