LAGOS, July 26, 2025 (BSS/AFP) - More than 600 malnourished children have died in northern Nigeria in six months after failing to receive proper care as foreign aid dries up, a medical charity has said.

Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said northern Nigeria, which already is struggling with an insurgency, is "currently facing an alarming malnutrition crisis".

Cases of the most severe and deadly form of malnutrition among children jumped by 208 percent between January and June compared with the same period last year.

"Unfortunately, 652 children have already died in our facilities since the beginning of 2025 due to a lack of timely access to care," the charity, which is known by its French initials, said in a statement released Friday.

Huge cuts in foreign aid sparked by US President Donald Trump's decision to slash spending overseas have combined with spiking living costs and a surge in jihadist attacks to create a dire situation in northern Nigeria.

Ahmed Aldikhari, country representative of MSF in Nigeria, said the cuts from the United States -- but also from the United Kingdom and European Union -- were hampering treatment and care for malnourished children.

He said "the true scale of the crisis exceeds all predictions".

Pregnant and breastfeeding women have not been spared, as an MSF survey on 750 mothers showed that more than half of them were "acutely malnourished, including 13 percent with severe acute malnutrition".

Across the country a record nearly 31 million people face acute hunger, according to David Stevenson, chief of the UN's food agency (WFP) in Nigeria.

WFP warned earlier this week it would be forced to suspend all emergency food and nutrition aid for 1.3 million people in northeast Nigeria at the end of July because of critical funding shortfalls.