The Beautiful Life

Despite several government health programmes, 39%  of children under five in India are short for their age, (stunted) according to findings by Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI) and the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). Vandana Krishna (IAS), Director General of Maharashtra State Health and Nutrition Mission spoke on why the government should take the problem of malnutrition seriously. Vandana has headed the Woman and Child department of the State twice, and has been the Secretary, Health and Family Welfare department and she has also been the Mission Director of National Rural Health Mission. Q How can we identify problems related to severe malnutrition like stunting and wasting? First, we must recognize that stunting is a huge problem for India. Stunting means low height for age and wasting means low weight for height. Early childhood stunting causes irreversible damage to overall health of children. Their IQ and lifelong productivity is affected...

Though major reasons stated as causes of severe malnutrition are biological and economical, little attention has been given to important factors including cultural beliefs, biases and domestic violence. The inferior status of women in general results in poor attention and care given to the female child. “The secondary status of women in our cultural fabric results in the girl child receiving secondary treatment, lowering her confidence. Discrimination being shown in her education, thereby affecting her personality lifelong and malnutrition per say in childhood,” added Dr Vibhawari Dani, who is working with an NGO, named MAHAN in Melghat, providing community based preventive care and therapeutic programme for malnutrition to tribal children through village health workers. Stressing on the staggering figures of low birth weight babies born in India, Dr Vibhawari Dani, former senior Professor of Paediatrics, Government Medical College, Nagpur, said, “Nearly 25% of babi...

Around 30% of Indian children aged under five are underweight, according to the Rapid Survey on Children (RSOC), which was carried out in 2013 and 2014 by the UN and the Indian government. The report published recently brings that under nutrition remains a challenge in India. Misconceptions are a prominent cause for concern. For instance, newborns are not breast-fed immediately after birth and colostrum, which helps build the baby’s immunity, is discarded in many cases. Dr Pramod Jog, President of Indian Academy of Paediatrics and Professor of Paediatrics at D Y Patil Medical College, Pune, said: “The major nutritional problems among Indian children are lack of proteins, Vitamin A deficiency, iron deficiency and iodine deficiency disorders.  Tribal children are prone to multiple deficiencies. Protein deficiency is the most widely prevalent form of malnutrition among children. Severe protein deficiency associated with infection contributes to high child mortality.” Explaining the t...