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Nutrition in Times of Crisis: Lebanon National Nutritional SMART Survey Report (August - September 2021)

Countries
Lebanon
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FAO
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Highlights

As Lebanon reels from a convergence of crises that have plunged the majority of the population into poverty, Lebanon Nutrition Sector launched the results of a new nationwide nutrition survey on under five-year-old children and women tapping on the malnutrition situation in the country, marked by major food and nutrition insecurity, poor health and nutrition practices, and a lack of access to quality services.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

UNICEF and MoPH in collaboration with Action Against Hunger Canada SMART team, successfully conducted a National survey, that had ten SMART surveys in it from July-September 2021. The National survey targeted the 8 Governorates with weighted analysis done for national estimates, and two camp surveys that targeted Syrian refugees residing in informal settlements and Palestine refugees in camps.

The main goal of the survey was to determine under 5 and maternal nutrition and health status.

The specific objectives of the survey were:

  • To estimate the prevalence of acute malnutrition (Weight for Height) among children aged 6 to 59 months.

  • To estimate the prevalence of stunting (Height for Age) in children aged 6-59 months.

  • To estimate the prevalence of underweight (Weight for Age) in children aged 6-59 months.

  • To estimate morbidity rates (ARI, acute flaccid paralysis, diarrhoea) among children 6-59 months; two weeks prior to the survey.

  • To estimate the proportion of children 0-59 months who received polio and measles containing vaccines.

  • To assess selected infant and young child feeding indicators among children 0 – 24 months; Exclusive Breast Feeding (EBF), Ever breastfed (EvBF), Mixed milk feeding (MixMF) Continued Breast Feeding (CBF), ISSSF, Minimum Dietary Diversity (MDD), Minimum Meal Frequency (MMF) and Minimum Acceptable Diet (MAD).

  • To assess nutritional status of pregnant and lactating women by MUAC.

  • To estimate the prevalence of anaemia among children 6 to 59 months and women of reproductive age.

  • To formulate recommendations to guide nutrition programming in Lebanon.

Standardized Monitoring Assessment for Relief and Transition Method (SMART) was used to conduct the surveys.

The methodology is a cross-sectional study design with 2-stage sampling approach. Stage 1 involved Sampling of clusters in every governorate/camp, while stage 2 involved segmentation of clusters and Simple Random sampling of household in selected clusters.

Household was used as the basic sampling unit.
Data collection tools were based on national and global guidelines and approved by the Technical Committee. Standard SMART questionnaire in ODK collect was used in tablets to collect data in 8 strata while hard copy questionnaire was employed in two strata (South and El Nabatieh). ENA for SMART was used in the analysis of anthropometric indicators while EPI-Info software for analysis of the additional indicators.