Four out of every 10 children in the country are facing malnutrition leading to stunted physical growth and compromised development of brains and immunity, says a report released on Thursday, adding child under nutrition rates in the country are among the highest in the world.
Jointly released by Women and Child Development Minister Maneka Gandhi and Health Minister JP Nadda, the ‘India Health Report: Nutrition 2015’ notes that in States such as Bihar, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh, malnutrition declines have been much slower than the national average.
latest data show that 39 per cent of all children under five are very short for their age which means they are stunted.
“This compares with a 24 per cent rate at the global level. Being stunted means that these children are not fulfilling their potential either in childhood or as adults. Their brains and immune systems are compromised, often for their entire life,” says the report.
On the occasion, the 2015 Global Nutrition Report (GNR) was also released.
Both the reports point to India’s improved performance in reducing its high burden of malnutrition but also underscored that this improvement could be much rapid.
Expressing concerns that despite rapid economic development, malnutrition continue to take toll on the children, Maneka Gandhi enlisted various measures to deal with the grave problem.
“We can consider providing packaged food to Anganwadi children to deal with increased malnourishment in the country,” she said.
She also stressed on imparting essential training to Anganwadi workers and that there was need for more coordination between Anganwadi workers and ASHAs and also between various Ministries.
Nadda suggested that there was an urgent need for “accelerating action at the State-level which is essential for changing the trajectory of India’s children’s future as the battle against under nutrition must now be fought at ground level in communities and at homes” and “Strengthening full accountability for delivery of set of high impact nutrition interventions critical to ensuring accelerated improvements in nutrition.”
Professor Ramanan laxminarayan from the Public Health Foundation India (PHFI), who is co-author of the India Health Report, said, “Even with recent impressive improvements, India’s stunting problem represents the largest loss of human potential in any country in human history. Even more worrisome, the problem of undernutrition in India now coexists with the problem of over nutrition and associated non-communicable diseases for a different segment of the population.”
The 2015 Global Nutrition Report notes that there has been a big increase in the number of countries on track to meet global nutrition targets, and encourages countries, including India, to establish specific and time bound targets for malnutrition reduction that are consistent with the new Sustainable Development Goals.”