Malnutrition
Experimental estimate · v0.8Early treatment and recovery among reported severe acute malnutrition admissions. Suffering before admission and untreated children are outside this estimate.
Early treatment and recovery
No matched cohort death count. Source context
reported treatment admissions
Approximate, assumption-based USU for the included experience. Deaths are a separate measure. Fatal suffering unestimated.
Reading the result
The working model assigns about 42.7 USU per reported admission. Applied to 174,737 admissions, it gives about 7.5 million USU. This describes a selected treatment cohort under simple assumptions, not all suffering from malnutrition or conflict in Sudan.
This provisional estimate excludes suffering before admission and children who did not receive treatment. Duration and intensity are assumptions, not measured Sudan averages. Access to treatment and reporting practices affect the count; more recorded admissions can reflect improved access rather than worsening suffering.
The calculation
42.7 USU per modeled course, before multiplying by the reported count. The calculation uses unrounded values; only the headline is rounded.
Intensity is assigned on a 0–10 scale and averaged over the whole elapsed course, including relief and sleep. Why divide by 47.25?
We assign a six-week course after admission. Historical outpatient programmes in South Sudan, a different country, reported 2021 mean stays of 42.3, 43.2 and 46.3 days under three adapted protocols. These provide context for a multiweek window. Forty-two days is our rounded choice, not measured suffering duration in Sudan in 2026. Nutritional treatment can continue after clinical improvement; pre-admission suffering is excluded. [S26] [S27]
Malnutrition can involve physical discomfort, digestive problems and irritability, while children eligible for outpatient care may have good appetite and no acute problems requiring hospital care. We assign 2 as a combined average across people and elapsed time, including improvement, relief, sleep and intervals without experience. The value is below the ordinary dengue value 3 because this course averages over a longer recovery window. Both the value and this comparison are judgments, not validated ratios to kidney-stone pain. Concurrent symptoms are bundled once. [S27] [S28]
At 28 days and intensity 1, the result is about 2.5 million USU. At 56 days and intensity 3, it is about 14.9 million USU.
These are alternative input scenarios, not confidence intervals or bounds on all uncertainty. Some cross-condition orderings change under these choices. The headline uses the single shared template above.
Coverage
One representative six-week early treatment and recovery course for each reported admission. Combined experienced discomfort and associated distress are counted once, allowing for improvement and relief. The reporting dates identify admissions; complete modeled courses can extend beyond June. The number is not a calendar-period total or a full course from first onset.
UNICEF reports 174,737 severe acute malnutrition admissions in the nutrition narrative for January-June 2026. Its headline rounds this to 174,700, while its results table lists 238,099. We select the narrative figure because it agrees with the headline and the stated 28% of the annual target; this does not establish that the table is wrong. The discrepancy remains unresolved. No averaging, summing or extrapolation to untreated children is applied. The report does not establish unique-child deduplication or how repeat admissions and transfers are counted. We assume one eligible course per reported admission. The conflicting table defines its indicator as ages 6-59 months; that exact age restriction is not independently verified for the selected narrative count. [S29] [S25]
Suffering before treatment admission, untreated children, moderate malnutrition, later or recurrent episodes outside the selected courses, long-term developmental harm, separate infection or injury burdens, broader conflict and displacement distress, caregiver distress, bereavement, death itself, lost life years and suffering after death.
Omitted experiences are unestimated, not known to be zero. This is not a complete event total or a guaranteed lower bound.
Whole representative courses are assigned to the source-defined cases or cohort. Course time can extend beyond the reporting dates. Individual trajectories, fatal-case truncation and a causal baseline are not reconstructed; no suffering after death is assigned.
Deaths remain separate
No death count aligned with these treatment admissions was identified in the reviewed report. Mortality stays unavailable. No national conflict death toll or borrowed case-fatality rate is substituted. The representative model includes admissions with unknown outcomes; it does not establish survival or actual person-time. [S25]
This estimate assigns a representative early treatment and recovery course to admissions with unknown outcomes. A separate fatal course is unestimated; this does not establish zero deaths, survival or actual person-time for each child.
No matched death count or outcome breakdown for the selected admission cohort was identified in the reviewed UNICEF report. We do not import a national war death toll or estimate deaths from a case-fatality rate borrowed from another population. [S25]
A death count aligned with the selected admissions, plus evidence for the corresponding admission-to-death course. Replace the ordinary allowance for those cases, keeping the same post-admission time scope; never add a terminal period on top. Suffering before admission would require a separately defined extension.
USU estimates experienced suffering during lived time. Death itself and lost life years are not assigned USU. A report can use a death count to identify a distinct course of suffering before death, as in the disease fatal-course calculations. Bereavement remains unestimated.
Trace the estimate
Stipulated six-hour kidney-stone reference: 47.25 modeled intensity-hours, with linear weighting. This convention defines the unit; it is not a measured equivalence between conditions.
The nutrition narrative on printed p. 4 gives 174,737 SAM admissions, with 174,700 in the headline. The results table on p. 11 gives 238,099 for severe wasting admissions; p. 12 identifies the same reporting period. We select the narrative count provisionally and show the alternative. Deduplication and aligned cohort outcomes are not established.
Historical outpatient programme data. The Length of stay section reports 2021 means of 42.3, 43.2 and 46.3 days under adapted protocols. These are treatment stays in South Sudan, not suffering durations in Sudan. The study excluded stays longer than 120 days. It does not measure USU intensity.
Outpatient eligibility can include good appetite and absence of acute problems requiring inpatient care. Indexed recommendation text was reviewed; the direct page encountered a browser check. This cautions against inferring uniform severe pain from a severe wasting diagnosis. It supplies no USU calibration.
General descriptions of low energy, digestive and appetite problems, irritability and lethargy. These are possible symptoms, not a measured Sudan cohort average or a numerical USU conversion.
Confirms the January-June reporting period and rounded headline of 174,700 treated children. This summarizes the same report, so it is not independent confirmation and does not resolve the annex discrepancy.