Indian teenagers are lacking behind in physical development

Researchers found that the majority of children did not grow to their age between childhood and early adolescence for several reasons. READ MORE

The research included children from all sections of rural and urban as well as poor and rich.

In almost all the countries of the world, hindrance in the physical growth of children is a major problem. At the same time, research has shown that Indian children are more prone to this problem than Peru, Vietnam and Ethiopia.

The growth of children in India stops at adolescence. The study was conducted by researchers at Harvard University in the US and Harvard TH Chain School of Public Health.

A total of 7,128 children from India, Ethiopia, Peru and Vietnam were surveyed in five phases between 2002 and 2016 for research.

The research included children from all sections of rural and urban as well as poor and rich. The survey took children from all over the country in Peru, Ethiopia and Vietnam, while only Andhra Pradesh children in India.

India ranks second in deaths due to pneumonia

The agency in the world said that pneumonia is the cause of 15 per cent of the total cases of deaths among children under the age of five.

India ranks second in the deaths of children under five in 2018 due to pneumonia.

The disease is now benign and it is possible to prevent it, in spite of it globally one child dies every 39 seconds.

This has been revealed in a new UN report. The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said that more than eight million children under the age of five died of pneumonia globally last year, or say one child died every 39 seconds.

Most of the children who died due to pneumonia were under two years of age and 1,53,000 children died in the first month of birth.

Most children died in Nigeria due to pneumonia. Here the figure stood at 1,62,000.

It is followed by India with a figure of 1,27,000, Pakistan with a figure of 58,000, Congo with a figure of 40,000, and Ethiopia with a figure of 32,000.

The agency of Sandra said that pneumonia is the cause of 15 per cent of the total cases of deaths among children under the age of five.

Despite this, only three per cent of the expenditure on global infectious disease research is spent on this disease.

There is also a strong correlation between death and poverty due to pneumonia.

Access to drinking water, lack of adequate health care and lack of nutrition and indoor air pollution increase the risk of the disease.

Air pollution is the cause of half of all deaths due to pneumonia. It is almost forgotten that pneumonia is also an epidemic.

UNICEF and other health and child organizations called for global action to bring awareness to this.

The data on the growth of these children when they were one, five, eight, twelve and fifteen years was hindered. The research found that an average of 43 per cent of the children in these four countries suffered from stunting at the age of one to five years.

About 32–41 per cent of these children could not recover even till adolescence. Although about 31–34 per cent of the children improved they regressed before becoming adults.

The study also found that out of the children who were growing at normal for five years, the growth of 13.1 per cent of children stopped between 8 and 15 years.

Researchers found that the majority of children did not grow to their age between childhood and early adolescence for several reasons.

At the geographical level, there was a significant variation in the growth inhibition, improvement in children and the tendency to stop growth again.

The percentage of stunted growth in Indian children is highest in all states except one-year-old children. Percentage of growth in one-year-old children was found to be 41 per cent in Ethiopia, which was 30 per cent in India.

Barring Ethiopia, five-year-old children showed more growth inhibition than one-year-old children in all three countries.

According to the researchers, however, there was a significant decrease in the problem of growth blockage with ageing.

But in India, compared to the rest of the countries, the problem of growth inhibition in children and adolescents in five stages remained almost the same.

The juvenile growth barrier in India was the highest at 27 per cent, while Vietnam had the lowest at 12.3 per cent.

In this research, apart from Professor SV Subramanian, a principal researcher of Indian origin, Javel Gossman and Rockley Kim were also involved.

Professor SV Subramanian explained, ‘Growth inhibition in children is a reversible activity, which depends on many circumstances like genetic, economic and geographical.

Although children can fall victim to it from childhood to adolescence, they can grow again if favourable conditions are found.

However, even in children who have been cured many times, there is a risk of re-growth due to adverse conditions. Therefore, there is a need to think seriously about stunting their growth until adolescence.

As a result of research, if adequate attention is paid to the growth of children with the initial 1000 days to adolescence, then their stagnant growth can be solved.

This study may prove to be helpful in detecting the growth trends of children in these four countries from childhood to adolescence in future.

At the same time, it can also give a better understanding of policymakers for the prevention and improvement of growth inhibition in children.

Originally published at https://www.mubahisa.in.