Impact of malnutrition on children

Nilratan Halder | Published: April 17, 2015 00:00:00 | Updated: November 30, 2024 06:01:00

Of the 19 million or so children under the age five, six million have suffered stunted growth in the country. The figure revealed in a roundtable held in the capital on Monday constitutes no less than 41 per cent of the total population of this age. This is rather alarming. Inadequate food is definitely the prime cause but there are other causes for such retarded growth. Absence of micronutrients like zinc, iron and iodine is also responsible for unhealthy development of children. The problem is further compounded by lack of sanitation and hygiene.
Sure enough, economic status of a family has a lot to do with the kind of food made available for its members including its children. But when it comes to the gains made by countries with low income, this rule in some cases has refreshingly been defied. Along with high-income countries such as Oman and Portugal and middle-income countries like Brazil, Mongolia and Turkey, low-income nations like Bangladesh, Liberia and Rwanda have all been successful in lowering their under-five mortality rate by more than two-thirds between 1990 and 2011.
Against this startling achievement, though, the 41 per cent children's stunted growth gives hardly any cause for feeling at ease. Undernutrition and micronutrient deficiencies leave a child with poor immunity to fight diseases. Naturally, such children stand the risk of falling ill and dying young. Even if they do not die, as manpower resources their productivity gets constrained severely. No wonder, therefore, that the growth problem has been set aside in three broad categories. The 41 per cent children under five with stunted growth are considered in terms of their low height for age, 16 per cent are viewed as wasted because of their low weight for height and 36 are found to be underweight on account of their low weight for age.
Now growth deficiency has its socio-economic costs. Effects of malnutrition on cognitive and physical functioning have not been measured. But it can be assumed that labour productivity is affected and the long-term health consequences exact a price in terms of expenditure on healthcare. It has been established that acute nutritional deficiencies are associated with 'neuroanatomical, emotional and behavioural effects on children's development'. Studies on undernutrition further report poor intelligent quotient (IQ) and underperformance in school.
Clearly, the impact of poverty on children's growth through intervention can be lessened but cannot be completely cured. Now that economic disparity in society is widening and poor people's means to gathering food from natural sources is getting further restricted, the apprehension is that their children will suffer even more in the days to come. As for the street children, whose number is ever increasing, the threat is even greater. Developing any habit for sanitation and hygiene is out of question for them.
Children of poor families and street children are both compelled to work often too heavy for them and in an environment hostile enough to cause their physical harm. Against this stark reality, it is impossible to achieve universal literacy in society and more importantly to arrange for a minimum level of education considered requisite for leading a modest and decent life. Children discriminated against right from their birth hardly ever have any opportunity to break free from their many layers of bondages. Damned and doomed, they do not figure in the government's development framework.
Apart from those wretched, even in modestly well-to-do families too childcare is grossly neglected because of lack of knowledge. When a parent smoke in his bedroom beside his pregnant wife or baby or when he accompanies it to school on a rickshaw or even in an air-conditioned car, the level of childcare gets grossly exposed. Now-a-days, parents are much too generous with handing pocket money for their children who are literally addicted to junk foods. Even they themselves are accustomed to purchasing such foods without any thought often in order to avoid the tedious process of preparing foods at home.
The result of such an indiscriminate preference for fast foods and beverage is disastrous. Well, in most cases, there is no nutritional deficiency but rather it is a case of overnutrition. What is, however, missing is the required balance in the foods eaten. Obesity is the most immediate result for some, for others it is an open invitation for a number of diseases at an early age.
There is no reason to think that those who cannot afford the luxury of visiting the fast food chains prepare foods in a hygienic condition. In most houses, rice is boiled and its starch is allowed to drain out until it becomes dry enough. Similarly, vegetables are chipped, processed, washed and cooked in a manner that a major portion of its vitamins and other beneficial contents are lost. All this happens out of ignorance.
On top of all these, the use of fertiliser, pesticide and harmful chemicals for preservation of foods pose a serious threat to all - only more to children. What transpires from all such developments is that people need basic education or age-old wisdom in order to organise their lives. Here is a nation that is imitating foreign habits without getting familiar with their virtues. And again, they are cut out of their roots and no longer believe in the knowledge that has been received from an ancient civilisation. The problem lies in this dilemma. Without improving the standard of living of people, fighting malnutrition will not quite succeed.
nilratanhalder2000@yahoo.com