22 per cent of under-5 deaths in 2013 occurred due to Malnutrition in India: Report

NEW DELHI: India accounts for most deaths of children aged below five years every year, with 50 per cent of these caused mainly by malnutrition, a new policy paper has said. The paper, released in March and prepared by NGO Forum for Learning and Action with Innovation and Rigour (FLAIR), estimates that 22 per cent of all under-five deaths worldwide occur in India. In 2013, over 15 lakh such children died in India. A Unicef report supports the figure.

According to the Unicef report, about 50 per cent of the world's under-five deaths occur in just five countries: India, Nigeria, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Pakistan and China. Lack of basic sanitation in India is seen as a key factor for the endemic child malnutrition. “(An) Unhygienic environment combined with high population density creates a perfect storm for diseases to thrive, and malnutrition to flourish,“ says Dr Raj Bhandari, adviser-health and nutrition at FLAIR.

According to Bhandari, the absence of sanitation exposes children to infectious diseases such as typhoid and diarrhoea, which rob them of their ability to absorb nutrients and make them vulnerable, causing co-morbidity .

The paper cites Kerala, Manipur, Mizoram and Sikkim to point out that states where 80 per cent or more of the rural population has access to toilets also have the lowest levels of child malnutrition.However, child malnutrition rates are high in states like Madhya Pradesh, Bihar and Jharkhand, where most households are with-out toilets. Apart from poor sanitation, food insecurity, lack of health care and extremely poor conditions of public health are considered major causes of malnutrition.