Confinement et pauvreté: stratégies d’adaptation des ménages défavorisés de la ville de Toamasina

The WHO report dated 04/05/2020 notes that more than 1,203,000 people have been infected in 181 countries around the world and more than 64,000 people have died. Madagascar is not spared this scourge and the city of Toamasina is one of the cities on the east coast most affected by this disease. It records 784 people infected and 11 cases deceased as of July 11, 2020. The objective of this article is to see how poor households lived with covid 19 during confinement. What adaptation strategies are based mainly on consumption and the means to cope with it? A retrospective cross-sectional study was carried out in the city of Toamasina, particularly in the district of Mangarano II, Parcel 11/47 and Andranomadio, Parcel 11/41 on a sample of 60 disadvantaged households. The results show us that 50.2% of households surveyed claimed to have reduced the number of meals eaten in a day, 16.6% had restricted adult consumption so that young children could eat; 8.3% limit portion size at meal time; 11.6% borrow food or rely on help from friends and 13.3% rely on less preferred and cheaper foods. To have the means to finance life during confinement, most of the households surveyed were forced to sell their household goods. It is around 80.9% and the others are distributed across the following strategies: purchasing food on credit, borrowing money without securing assets, begging, spending savings, selling land. Even if there was aid provided by the government under the famous “Tosika Fameno, this scourge weighs heavily on the daily life of Malagasy households.