Guatemala, Aug 19 (NNN-Prensa Latina) - Alarming malnutrition spread in some Guatemalan areas forced the country's authorities to declare different alert stages, including maximum, aimed at fighting this scourge, mostly in children.

Orange and pink are the categories established, where cases are more evident.

According to local media reports, thousands of Guatemalans that live in 4,089 communities are at high risk of suffering famine, resulting from a drop to 80 and 60 percent in their harvest of beans and corn, respectively.

From May till now, the number of populations at risk has increased 114 percent, according to a report by the Secretariat of Food and Nutritional Security.

According to those data, the most affected localities are in El Progreso, Zacapa, Chiquimula, Jalapa and Jutiapa departments, which are included in the dry corridor in eastern Guatemala.

In Jalapa, where they decreed orange alert, many people have been assisted in health centers so far and the number of communities, where great vulnerability has been detected have reached 113, a large number of children affected by malnutrition or dying of hunger, the authorities said.

Red alert has been decreed in Baja Verapaz department, where 160 communities from seven municipalities have reported lack of the necessary food for survival and the cases of malnutrition are evident.

The country's authorities have planned distribution of products as corn, beans, fortified flour, chicken and cooking oil, and other actions that will also be extended to the rest of the affected areas, to lessen the impact of those in difficulty. -- (NNN-Prensa Latina)