PREVALENCE of stunted children is high in low literacy and lower income groups resulting from poor food and malnutrition intake and experts hold the view that it should not be treated as an individual problem of families because it affects the nation as a whole in terms of productivity loss and a slow down in the GDP growth. News report published in a national English daily on Sunday last said nearly 40 percent of under five children in Bangladesh are stunted some way to remind the need for focused programmes to address the problem as it remains a far reaching menace to the society. This is because stunted persons may also cause a generational problem by reproducing malnourished and physically impaired children to cause drainage to the nation’s health budget, in addition to impacting its socio-economic growth.
We see that stunted growth of children results from a host of factors including lack of safe drinking water, poor sanitation and unhygienic condition of living, poverty, high density of population, insufficient food intake and environmental pollution. It impacts growth in the first 1,000 days of life – from the beginning of life in the mother’s womb to two years of age to cause serious irreversible damage to children’s minds and bodies in the form of stunting, low height and weight and so on. It affects children’s intellectual development at the end.
Some other causes to result in stunting include weaker immune systems and higher risk from diseases like diarrhoea and pneumonia. These may again lead to increased likelihood of chronic diseases in children such as high blood pressure, diabetes, heart disease, and obesity. The social consequences of these diseases and disorders are enormous as they are affecting children and preventing them from going to schools and leading a healthy life. Gradually they become a burden to the family and society. Study results showed the economy suffers the productivity loss of over Tk 7,000 crore per year in Bangladesh, in addition to increased expenditure by the government in many other ways.
As the remedy to this problem, we hold the view that there should be enough awareness campaigns in the first place in the media and not only the government, other non-government organizations and financial institutions should also join hand to hand to fight back the menace. We also believe that multi-sectoral stakeholders including the ministries of food, agriculture, livestock and fisheries may take up focused programmes. Ministries of education, health and family planning, women and children’s affairs and environment and such other bodies have also a responsibility to play a significant role in ameliorating the situation. Particularly nutrition-specific objectives need to be incorporated in their programme.
We also suggest that National Nutrition Council (1974) and the National Food Policy (2006) need to be made more responsive to put in place critically focused policies and action programmes to fight back the menace. The leadership lies with the government. We can’t afford to create a generation with a huge number of stunted children who will remain a burden, in addition to causing productivity losses to the nation. We must act now.
