1 in 5 Pinoy children suffers from stunted growth

MANILA, Philippines – One in every five Filipino children aged zero to five years suffers from stunted growth because of poor feeding practices, a report from the United Nations Children’s Fund (Unicef) said.

In “Tracking Progress on Child and Maternal Development” report, the Unicef said some 200 million children below five years old in developing countries suffer from stunted growth caused by chronic maternal and childhood undernutrition.

More than 90 percent of stunted children in developing nations live in Africa and Asia.

The Philippines has succeeded in reducing the deaths of children under five years because of under-nutrition, but many children still suffer from stunted growth because they do not receive proper nutritional requirement from the critical stage of infancy to two years of age.

Pregnant mothers are also not eating well and do not receive quality prenatal health services.

The most critical period for a child’s development is the 1,000 days from conception until the second birthday. Nutritional deficiencies during this period lessen the ability to survive diseases and can impair their social and mental abilities.

Unicef said under-nutrition is often “invisible until it is severe.”

“Children who appear healthy may be at grave risk of serious and even permanent damage to their health and development,” the report said.

Under-nutrition also causes children to be underweight, and likewise exposed to health and developmental problems. This, however, can be remedied if nutrition improves in childhood.

Unicef executive director Ann Veneman said under-nutrition compromises the immune system, causing death from diseases that could have been survived with a healthy immune system.

“More than one-third of children who die from pneumonia, diarrhea and other illnesses could have survived had they not been under-nourished,” Veneman said.

“Those who survive under-nutrition often suffer poorer physical health throughout their lives, and damaged cognitive abilities that limit their capacity to learn and to earn a decent income. They become trapped in an intergenerational cycle of ill-health and poverty,” she added. –Shiela Crisostomo (The Philippine Star)