By Patrick Vanderpool
Impunity Watch Reporter, South America

Buenos Aires, Argentina – Argentine Government officials admitted to an increased number of deaths among the country’s poor of indigenous people due to malnutrition and  promised government action to minimize the problem. Reports of malnutrition deaths stemmed from a joint study conducted by London’s Imperial College and the University of Harvard in Boston showing that Argentina, Chile and Venezuela topped the list of overweight people in Latin America.

The Argentine Government has faced criticism for not doing enough to ease poverty among the country’s non-European population. Critics of President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner earlier called for more vigorous measures to pursue the government’s poverty reduction programs.

Jose Manuel Urtubey, Governor of the northern province of Salta, said in a television interview that at least five children had died of malnutrition in 2010 and officials recorded another death this year. According to Urtubey, most of these deaths are of indigenous children. The governor warned that more malnutrition cases might be present in isolated indigenous communities that may not have extensive contact with individuals or organizations outside of their group.

Fatalities included an 18-month-old toddler and a 3-year old female child; both of whose deaths were initially attributed to infections. A third case of another 18-month-old toddler, reported to have died due to “septic shock caused by malnutrition,” brought great attention on malnutrition deaths.

The Argentine media was in an uproar after learning of the deaths. The Salta and Buenos Aires media quoted the father of one of the toddlers, who said he lost his child on a day when he returned from work in the woods to find there was nothing at hand that he could feed the children. According to the father, “there are some days when we manage to have a meal to eat and days when we don’t…on that day we had nothing to eat.”

For more information, please see:

Spero News – Argentina: Missionaries Address Malnutrition and Sexual Abuse of Children – 7 February 2011

UPI – Argentina Admits to Malnutrition Deaths Among the Poor – 7 February 2011

Merco Press – Argentine Aborigine Children Die of Malnutrition and Poor Sanitary Conditions – 6 February 2011