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Health Ministry debunks FAO report on SL’s child undernourishment
The Ministry of Health (MoH) last week refuted the UN Food & Agriculture Organisation (FAO) report, ranking Sri Lanka the second highest in undernourishment among 5-year-olds in South Asian (SA) countries.
The report published last week said recent FAO studies found Sri Lanka to have 22.1% malnutrition, a step better than its troubled neighbour Afghanistan with 23%.
Health Services Director General Anil Jasinghe denying the claim, said that, the FAO report is not a measure of Malnutrition, but a measure of undernourishment which is a proxy of food security.
In a press release he said that prevalence of undernourishment is an estimated figure calculated using a given formula and estimated food data consumption obtained through surveys, taking into account the total supply and utilisation of all food commodities in a given country.
As such, the MoH questions the accuracy of the estimates in the report, due to the probabilistic nature of the inference and the margins of uncertainty associated with the estimates.
He said that, according to the Sri Lanka Demographic & Health Survey conducted by the Dept. of Census & Statistics in 2016, longstanding under-nutrition that causes short stature or stunting among children under 5 years, is only 17%.
The World Health Organisation (WHO), in its report, said that Sri Lanka has the lowest prevalence of short stature in SA countries, with the figure standing below 20%.
Nepal and India recorded over 35%.
In the same survey, where wasting, which results from acute under-nutrition was considered, Sri Lanka reported only 15%. Dr Jasinghe said, “Although wasting was higher compared with some other countries in the region, Sri Lanka was not plagued with severe clinical symptoms such as Kwashiorkor and Marasmus, within the past decade, while no deaths or severe illnesses have been reported because of under-nutrition.
Dr Jasinghe said the MoH has identified under-nutrition as a Public Health problem.
Under the MoH’s Maternal & Child Health Programme, it has introduced several measures to address the problem. This includes evidence based interventions on Nutrition recommended by the WHO, preventive and curative health services, promoting proper breastfeeding and complementary feeding of infant and young child, regular weighing and measuring height of children.
The screening, he said, identifies problems related to Nutrition that enables to give dietary counseling to mothers, together with supplementary doses of Vitamin A.
Multiple micro nutrient supplements are also administered to prevent anaemia and diseases connected with the deficiencies. De-worming is also another option done periodically.
In addition, children identified with under-nutrition, the MoH distributes Thriposha, and for children with severe wasting, therapeutic feeding programmes are conducted through Paediatricians and Nutrition clinics in government hospitals.
The MoH, with its focus on improving the coverage and quality of its interventions, is now seeking the assistance of other relevant ministries to implement programmes that would improve the Nutrition status of children.