A $45 Treatment Can Save a Starving Child. US Cuts Aid.

The women of Maiduguri walked miles through dusty streets, carrying frail, emaciated children in their arms. By 7 a.m., they were already waiting in long lines for the small red packets of therapeutic paste that could mean the difference between life and death.

The children in their arms were hauntingly silent. Too weak to play or swat flies from their faces, many looked years younger than their true age. Near the front, Kaltum Mohammad held her two-year-old daughter, Fatima, who weighed only 16 pounds.

Until recently, clinics across northeastern Nigeria offered steady supplies of these packets. But six months after the United States pulled back foreign aid, many of those centers have shut down or are running on fumes. What once felt like lifelines are disappearing.

While Gaza’s crisis has drawn headlines, far less attention has been given to the ripple effects of dismantling U.S.A.I.D., which funded nearly half the world’s ready-to-use therapeutic food, known as R.U.T.F. The freeze has left countless children without the treatments they need.

These packets, costing less than 30 cents each, contain peanuts, milk powder, sugar, oil, and vital nutrients. A full six-week course is under $45 — a modest investment with lifesaving returns. Yet, that modest stream of support has been disrupted.

The Trump administration abruptly froze foreign aid earlier this year. Although some reimbursements were made and a new $93 million UNICEF grant was approved, the figure falls far short of the $200 million the U.S. had provided annually.

Funding delays mean manufacturers, shipping companies, and aid groups like UNICEF and the International Rescue Committee have been left in limbo. Clinics across Africa and Asia are shuttering as supply chains stall.

The State Department insists malnutrition programs remain a priority, but has emphasized that national governments and international organizations must step up. That shift leaves enormous gaps in the meantime.

Nigeria, Kenya, and Burkina Faso have begun hosting factories to produce therapeutic foods, and UNICEF’s Child Nutrition Fund tries to spur government contributions with dollar-for-dollar matching. Progress, however, has been abruptly undercut.

Now, warehouses and ports are filled with stuck shipments, while treatment centers from Syria to Chad stand empty. Aid workers warn that thousands of children are already at risk of death, with tens of thousands more in danger in the coming weeks.

The scale of closures is staggering. In Nigeria alone, 150 World Food Programme clinics treating 300,000 young children have shut down. Similar shutdowns stretch across Chad, Mali, Niger, Kenya, South Sudan, and Afghanistan, where nearly a million children need help.

Mothers like 35-year-old Maryam Mohamed, who cares for six children, now trek from one camp to another, only to find doors closed. At Mashamari camp, where she currently seeks treatment, supplies are expected to run out this month.

Even new funding will take months to translate into food in children’s hands. Products must be manufactured, shipped, and transported along poor roads or across conflict zones. For some children, that wait will be fatal.

Doctors Without Borders, Action Against Hunger, and other groups already report deaths linked to malnutrition, despite official denials from Washington. Global studies suggest up to 160,000 children could die each year if funding is not restored.

For families like those in Maiduguri, the politics of aid are irrelevant. Their reality is simple: without those small red packets, children like Fatima will not survive. And with each clinic that closes, the line between life and death grows thinner.