Dietary management of moderate malnutrition: time for a change.

All children with moderate wasting, or moderate or severe stunting, have in common a higher risk of dying and the need for special nutritional support. In contrast to children suffering from life-threatening severe acute malnutrition, there is no need to feed these children with highly fortified therapeutic foods designed to replace the family diet. Their dietary management should be based on improving the existing diets by nutritional counselling and, if needed, by the provision of adapted food supplements providing nutrients which cannot be easily provided by local foods. Children with growth faltering would also benefit from the same approach.