Child Undernutrition

Background: Research on trends in child undernutrition in Kenya has been hindered by the challenges of changing
criteria for classifying undernutrition, and an emphasis in the literature on international comparisons of countries’
situations. There has been little attention to within-country trend analyses. This paper presents child undernutrition
trend analyses from 1993 to 2008–09, using the 2006 WHO criteria for undernutrition. The analyses are decomposed by
child’s sex and age, and by maternal education level, household Wealth Index, and province, to reveal any departures
from the overall national trends.
Methods: The study uses the Kenya Demographic and Health Survey data collected from women aged 15–49 years
and children aged 0–35 months in 1993, 1998, 2003 and 2008–09. Logistic regression was used to test trends.
Results: The prevalence of wasting for boys and girls combined remained stable at the national level but declined
significantly among girls aged 0–35 months (p < 0.05). While stunting prevalence remained stagnant generally, the
trend for boys aged 0–35 months significantly decreased and that for girls aged 12–23 months significantly increased
(p < 0.05). The pattern for underweight in most socio-demographic groups showed a decline.
Conclusion: The national trends in childhood undernutrition in Kenya showed significant declines in underweight
while trends in wasting and stunting were stagnant. Analyses disaggregated by demographic and socio-economic
segments revealed some significant departures from these overall trends, some improving and some worsening.
These findings support the importance of conducting trend analyses at detailed levels within countries, to inform
the development of better-targeted childcare and feeding interventions.
Keywords: Undernutrition, Wasting, Stunting, Underweight, Trends, Demographic and Health Survey, Kenya

This article examines the trends and pattern in socioeconomic inequality in stunting, underweight and wasting among children aged <3 years in urban India over a 14-year period. We use three successive rounds of the National Family Health Survey data conducted during 1992-93, 1998-99 and 2005-06. The selected socioeconomic predictors are household wealth and mother's education level. We use principal component analysis to compute a separate wealth index for urban India for all three rounds of the survey. We have used descriptive statistics, concentration index and pooled logistic regression to analyse the data. The results show that between 1992-93 and 2005-06, the prevalence of childhood undernutrition has declined across household wealth quintiles and educational level of mothers. However, the pace of decline is much higher among the better-off socioeconomic groups than among the least-affluent groups. The result of pooled logistic regression analysis shows that the socioeconomic inequality in childhood undernutrition in urban India has increased over the study period. The salient findings of this study call for separate programmes targeting the children of lower socioeconomic groups in urban population of India.

This study intended to assess agrobiodiversity of Lemo and Soro districts selected localities, to evaluate demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, to analyze the house hold dietary diversity and to assess the nutritional status of children’s from 6-59 months of age. Sample size determined by using Epi Info 7.0 software, Agrobiodiversity assessed by using FAO guidelines and Anthropometric data collected by the method designed by Gibson. House hold dietary diversity and socioeconomic characteristics data were collected by using semi-structured questionnaires. Three localities of Soro district have showed low agrobiodiversity status and 66.66% of the households recorded low household dietary diversity. On these areas 39.2% of children’s are underweight, 25.5% are stunted as compared with WHO reference standards. Furthermore, 10.8% of the children’s are wasted. On contrary, other three localities have good agrobiodiversity and only 28.4 % of households scored low dietary diversit...

Background: Research on trends in child undernutrition in Kenya has been hindered by the challenges of changing criteria for classifying undernutrition, and an emphasis in the literature on international comparisons of countries' situations. There has been little attention to within-country trend analyses. This paper presents child undernutrition trend analyses from 1993 to 2008-09, using the 2006 WHO criteria for undernutrition. The analyses are decomposed by child's sex and age, and by maternal education level, household Wealth Index, and province, to reveal any departures from the overall national trends. Methods: The study uses the Kenya Demographic and Health Survey data collected from women aged 15-49 years and children aged 0-35 months in 1993, 1998, 2003 and 2008-09. Logistic regression was used to test trends. Results: The prevalence of wasting for boys and girls combined remained stable at the national level but declined significantly among girls aged 0-35 months (p < 0.05). While stunting prevalence remained stagnant generally, the trend for boys aged 0-35 months significantly decreased and that for girls aged 12-23 months significantly increased (p < 0.05). The pattern for underweight in most socio-demographic groups showed a decline. Conclusion: The national trends in childhood undernutrition in Kenya showed significant declines in underweight while trends in wasting and stunting were stagnant. Analyses disaggregated by demographic and socioeconomic segments revealed some significant departures from these overall trends, some improving and some worsening. These findings support the importance of conducting trend analyses at detailed levels within countries, to inform the development of better-targeted childcare and feeding interventions.

Resumen Este trabajo tiene por objeto describir el marco normativo del derecho a la salud aplicable a un grupo vulnerable de población delimitado por niños de hasta cuatro años de edad con problemas de desnutrición, diagnóstico que los ubica asimismo dentro del derecho a la alimentación.
La desnutrición impide que los individuos y las sociedades desarrollen todo su potencial (UNICEF, 2006). Es por ello que la lucha contra su erradicación y la prevención son centrales para el cumplimiento de objetivos y metas de desarrollo sostenible y, en definitiva, para garantizar el cumplimiento de derechos fundamentales.
Según la Organización Mundial de la Salud (2017) el término “malnutrición” se refiere a las carencias, los excesos y desequilibrios de la ingesta calórica y de nutrientes de una persona. Abarca tres grandes grupos de afecciones: desnutrición, malnutrición relacionada con los micronutrientes y el sobrepeso y obesidad.
Se distingue así la malnutrición de la desnutrición, vocablos que muchas veces se los utiliza en forma indistinta.
En cuanto a la desnutrición, existen cuatro tipos principales: emaciación (insuficiencia de peso respecto de la talla), retraso del crecimiento (talla insuficiente respecto de la edad), insuficiencia ponderal (peso menor de lo que corresponde a su edad) y carencias de vitaminas y minerales. Por causa de la desnutrición, los niños, en particular, son mucho más vulnerables ante la enfermedad y la muerte.
Los niños y niñas son -por definición- un grupo vulnerable por su falta de madurez, de formación y por su debilidad física, entre otros factores. Así es que ellos gozan de los derechos humanos propios de toda persona (universalidad) y, a la vez, cuentan con una mayor protección a la que corresponden deberes específicos de la familia, la sociedad y el Estado.
Se hará hincapié en uno de los componentes básicos de estos derechos en juego -su accesibilidad- a fin de facilitarlos mediante su eje de acceso a la información, entendiendo que la difusión de las normas vigentes en los equipos de salud, familias y comunidad en general podrá colaborar en su goce efectivo.
Asimismo, su sistematización favorecerá -en el plano de la responsabilidad de los Estados- la toma de decisiones tendientes al desarrollo y profundización de políticas públicas que garanticen el acceso al derecho a la salud y a la alimentación adecuada en la niñez en casos con problemas de desnutrición.
Abstract Undernourishment prevents individuals and societies from developing their full potential. It is for this reason that the fight against its eradication and prevention are central to the achievement of sustainable development goals and targets and, ultimately, to guarantee the fulfillment of fundamental rights, such as the right to health of children up to four years old with problems of undernourishment, a diagnosis that also places them within the right to food.
The minimum normative framework in force in Argentina will be described so as to collaborate in the development and deepening of public policies that guarantee them.

Objectives: Guided by the UNICEF framework for childcare, this study examined the association of childcare practices (CCP) with infant and young children's growth (height-forage Z-scores, HAZ), and investigated whether care practices are more important to growth in some sociodemographic subgroups of children. Design: Cross-sectional survey. Setting: Urban and rural Ghana. Participants: The study sample comprised 1187 dyads of mothers aged 15-49 years and their youngest child (aged 6-36 months). Results: The results showed that CCP was a significant predictor of HAZ, after controlling for covariates/confounders at child, maternal and household levels. Children with higher CCP scores had higher HAZ. A 1-unit increase in the CCP score was associated with a 0.17-unit increase in HAZ. Child's and mother's age, number of children under 5 years, place of residence, maternal weight and wealth index were also significantly associated with HAZ. Statistical interaction analyses revealed no subgroup differences in the CCP/HAZ relationship. Conclusions: This study found a significant, positive association between CCP and child growth, after accounting for other important determinants of child growth at maternal and household levels. This calls for research into the effects on growth of various CCP components, with longitudinal cohort study designs that can disentangle causal relationships.