Nutrition in humanitarian crises: from hunger to comprehensive protection
- Page updated onMarch 15, 2026
Learning pathways guide you in depth through a topic via a curated sequence of Salud everywhere pages, which you can read at your own pace. Each page includes AI-assisted reflection questions. At the end, a complex case study, also AI-assisted, will put your learning to the test.
For health and nutrition professionals entering the humanitarian world, frontline staff in nutrition interventions looking to update and expand their knowledge, professionals from other sectors (WASH, protection, food security) who need to understand integrated nutrition responses, and coordination and management staff seeking to master the technical terminology and key competencies in nutrition.
To understand the causes of hunger and malnutrition in crises and how to respond to them, including the diagnosis and treatment of acute and chronic malnutrition and micronutrient deficiencies. To protect nutrition at the most critical stages of the life cycle, from breastfeeding to early childhood development. And to frame the nutrition response within a multisectoral approach: community health, WASH, food security and advocacy strategies.
Around 5 hours in total: approximately 4.5 hours to read the 11 pages, watch the videos, answer the reflection questions and consult the AI assistant, plus an additional half hour to complete the final case study.
Part I: hunger, malnutrition and their causes in emergencies
The pathway begins with Hunger in the world: food insecurity, malnutrition and humanitarian crises. This is the starting point for understanding hunger and food insecurity, a global problem affecting more than 700 million people that is further compounded by humanitarian crises.
We continue with Acute child malnutrition (wasting): evolution and challenges in diagnosis and community management. This page introduces the most urgent nutritional medical condition: acute malnutrition. It explains key concepts and how diagnosis and treatment have evolved to the present day, while also addressing the complex challenge of increasing coverage of its management in humanitarian contexts and the innovations seeking to help achieve this.
We move on to Chronic child malnutrition (stunting): causes, diagnosis and prevention. This page not only addresses a problem affecting 1 in 4 children worldwide, but is also essential for beginning to understand the importance of a multisectoral approach to malnutrition, beyond the humanitarian nutrition and health sectors.
Before continuing with other forms of malnutrition, we must address Diarrhoeal diseases and cholera in humanitarian crises: WASH, oral rehydration and vaccines. This page helps understand the vicious cycle in which faeco-oral infections worsen nutritional status, while malnutrition weakens the immune system. It also sheds light on the elevated risk of these conditions in humanitarian emergencies and the importance of water, sanitation and hygiene interventions.
It is now time to explore Micronutrient deficiencies: hidden hunger and its prevention in humanitarian crises. We focus here on the deficiencies of iron, vitamin A and zinc that affect more than half of all children and the public health challenge they represent.
The final page of this section is Low birthweight, prematurity and growth restriction: small and vulnerable newborns. It addresses the intergenerational cycle of malnutrition and how maternal malnutrition increases the risk of vulnerable newborns, who may become the malnourished children of tomorrow if they do not receive adequate support and protection in time.
Part two: multisectoral strategies for child protection and care
We open this second section with Breastfeeding and complementary feeding: importance, challenges and protection in emergencies. This page presents the first line of immunological and nutritional protection in early childhood, along with the challenges of promoting and protecting it in humanitarian contexts.
It is now time to explore Primary health care, community health and the importance of community health workers. This page presents the core around which any health system guaranteeing the right to health must be built, and the role played within it by community health workers. It provides a deeper understanding of the integrated vision of nutrition and health actions, and offers examples of the importance of advocacy and systems transformation, beyond the mere provision of services.
We now turn to Introduction to sexual and reproductive health in emergencies: rights, MISP and the 2025 crisis. This page allows us to connect nutrition with reproductive rights, highlighting family planning, the prevention of unintended pregnancies, the fight against gender-based violence and antenatal care as pillars of family nutrition.
We now turn to Mental health and psychosocial support (MHPSS) in humanitarian crises. This page is key for moving beyond the medicalisation of suffering, understanding how the circumstances of humanitarian crises and emergencies directly affect feeding practices, and grasping the importance of addressing psychosocial and emotional wellbeing in children and caregivers.
We close with Early childhood development care: nurturing care in humanitarian crises. This final page brings together many of the previous themes related to health, nutrition, child protection in humanitarian crises and nurturing care within a comprehensive wellbeing framework, essential for overcoming the most vulnerable stage of malnutrition risk and achieving healthy physical, intellectual and emotional development.
Final evaluation
You have completed all the recommended pages. Below is the final assessment exercise. It consists of a case study with a series of questions. Try to answer them by applying everything you have studied in this pathway.
Once you have completed your response and clicked the button, a NotebookLM specific to this pathway will open. Paste your clipboard content there (Ctrl+V on Windows, Command+V on Mac) to receive feedback. This time, the feedback will be somewhat different from the reflection questions. NotebookLM will provide a brief critical analysis of your response, identify your progress towards the pathway's learning objectives and suggest some additional bibliographic references.
🧠 Case study
You are working in a region facing a complex crisis driven by a prolonged conflict and extreme drought. According to the latest data, food insecurity is at IPC Phase 4. The nutrition cluster estimates that the global prevalence of acute malnutrition exceeds 10%, although complete and up-to-date information is not available. Many families are displaced in informal settlements without adequate sanitation. Humanitarian funding for sexual, reproductive, maternal and neonatal health has been drastically cut, affecting the availability of contraceptives and antenatal care.
As the health and nutrition manager of an NGO working in the area, you are supporting a programme of community health and nutrition workers who visit families. You visit the shelter of Amina, a recently displaced mother, and her husband Abdulaye. She tells you that her youngest child, a 4-month-old boy, was born very small, and that because she feels she does not have enough milk to feed him, she has started giving him water and some maize porridge. She also explains that her 3-year-old daughter has had diarrhoea several times in recent days and is very weak. Amina admits feeling exhausted, very alone, and overwhelmed by a persistent sadness that prevents her from caring for her children as she would like. Abdulaye is very irritable and is demanding medicines and formula milk for the baby. At a moment when Abdulaye is not listening, Amina also mentions that she has been unable to access family planning since fleeing her village.
1. What vital risks exist for both children and what are their causes?
2. What kind of support do you think Amina and Abdulaye need as caregivers?
3. How do you think these risks should be addressed, both at the level of this family and in the informal settlement where they live?
4. What nutrition-related services do you think should be offered at the primary health care centre that the NGO is supporting near this settlement?
- Think and write your answer.
- Click on «Copy and open».
- Paste to receive feedback.
📚 This is the NotebookLM of this learning pathway. It uses only carefully selected references. | What is NotebookLM?
This is only the beginning...
Take some time to revisit the concepts you feel less confident about. You can also follow some of the recommended links within the pages or ask additional questions in the NotebookLM for each page to explore topics of interest in much greater depth.
You can also visit related pages on Salud Everywhere to read about gender (wouldn't it be important to address gender roles to improve caregiving practices and distribute workload and responsibility more fairly?), contraception (what family planning method would be most appropriate in this case?), gender-based violence (what risks have increased for Amina in her current situation?) or maternal and neonatal health, among other topics.
And of course, you can start another learning pathway.