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Nutrition, Health and Population |
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Source: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, Statistics Database
Nutrition, Health and Population Links
There are a number of key health issues for developing countries, especially in Africa. They include malnutrition, HIV/AIDS, malaria, tuberculosis and avian flu. This page provides current developments on these issues as well as background.
Nutrition See also Hunger Notes special report on the food and hunger crisis
Progress has been made in treating malnutrition in Sahelian children, including ready-to-eat foods and big shift to outpatient treatment IRIN News July 21, 2010
Bits of spirulina cake. Photo: Phuong Tran/IRIN.
Highly nutritious green cakes could save lives: The spirulina story IRIN News June 30, 2010
Child deaths decrease from 11.9 million in 1990 to an estimated 7.7 million this year--still a great distance from Millennium development goal of reducing child deaths by two-thirds (to about 4 million) in 2015 Denise Grady New York Times May 23, 2010
Plumpy'nut is one of the most widely distributed ready-to-use therapeutic foods (RUTF), given to children suffering from malnutrition. The patents for Plumpy'nut - a blend of peanuts, sugar, milk powder, oil, vitamins and minerals - are owned by a French company and a research institute. Manufacturers of similar pastes have been reluctant to challenge Nutriset because the patents are so broad, but two US companies just have, saying there should be "no restrictions on the development and production of life-saving food aid". Photo: Georgina Cranston/UNICEF
Plumpy'nut patent under pressure IRIN News January 12, 2010 See also Birthplace of an innovation saving the lives of starving children--a blender in Malawi IRIN News June 22, 2007 See Hunger Notes special report: Trade and hunger
One third of children in Sikasso are underweight for their age, and for acute malnutrition, the rate in Sikasso was 16 percent, according to the most recent government survey. Photo: Phuong Tran/ IRIN
In Mali's richest region, Sikasso, malnutrition is as high as in the country's barren north, due in large part to concentration on cash crop, export-oriented production in the rich region IRIN News December 29, 2009 Also see Hunger Notes special report: Trade and hunger
World cereal production is at its second-highest level ever, yet food prices remain very high. In Asia for example, prices are up 40-70 percent. Photo: Kamila Hyat/IRIN
World hunger increases despite growth in food production IRIN News November 12, 2009
200 million children under the age of five in the developing world suffer from chronic undernutrition, causing one-third of deaths in children under five, the United Nations Children's Fund says BBC News November 11, 2009 Access UNICEF report and video
HIV infection, leading to AIDS, is a major world problem, especially in Africa. In addressing the problem of HIV infection, there have been major concerns.
The first major concern is that African people and governments have been unable to afford the level of care available in the United States and other developed countries, where (expensive) anti-retroviral therapy has not cured HIV/AIDS, but has permitted substantially longer life for those infected. In the last several years this has been partially addressed by two major developments. First is a significant increase in developed country assistance. The second is the (partial) resolution of international property rights disputes over anti-retroviral (ARV) drugs, which has permitted a substantial reduction in the cost of ARV drugs supplied in developing countries.
The second major concern is the persistence of behavior patterns that permit HIV infection. The three principal ways of HIV infection are by sexual contact, though blood transmission (by drug users sharing the same needle, and by medical procedures, especially blood transfusion, not adopting proper safeguards) and by mother to child transmission. Sexual contact is the major means of HIV infection, with mother to child transmission a consequence of sexual contact. HIV testing will alert HIV-positive people that they are HIV positive, and ideally they will take measures to protect their sexual partners against infection, and to not have children or to take measures to reduce the possibility of HIV infection in the newborn.
Dinavance Kamukama, 28, front right, with her cousins in Kampala, Uganda. She is on a waiting list for AIDS medication. Uganda is the first country where major clinics routinely turn people away, but it will not be the last. In Kenya next door, grants to keep 200,000 on drugs will expire soon. An American-run program in Mozambique has been told to stop opening clinics. There have been drug shortages in Nigeria and Swaziland. Tanzania and Botswana are trimming treatment slots, according to a report by the medical charity Doctors Without Borders.
Obama's overdue AIDS bill Desmond Tutu New York Times July 20, 2010
In Uganda, AIDS war is falling apart--prevention is failing and there is no new money for anti-retroviral drugs Donald G. McNeil Jr. New York Times May 9, 2010 More nutrition and health stories
South African president Zuma 'deeply regrets pain' over love-child fathered with a woman who was not one of his wives BBC News February 6, 2010 President Zuma gives exactly the wrong lesson on HIV prevention (multiple sexual partners and no condoms--the principal way HIV is spread) to a nation where HIV is the biggest killer Kerry Cullinan Health-e (Zambia) February 2, 2010
Slowed funding threatens AIDS fight, group says--recession, other factors causing international donors to pull back Karin Brulliard Washington Post November 5, 2009
Other diseases and health concerns
Dr. Archana R. Khade, left, and a nurse, Sunita Laxman Jadhav, right, explained incentives to delay childbirth to a new bride near Satara this month. Photo: Kuni Takahashi/New York Times
India tries using cash payments to slow birthrates Jim Yardley New York Times August 21, 2010
Most women in sub-Saharan Africa give birth with no skilled health worker present. Photo: Anne-Isabelle Leclercq/IRIN
Global: The worst places to be a mother IRIN News May 7, 2010 More nutrition and health stories
A woman and her baby at the government hospital in Makeni, Sierra Leone. In Sierra Leone one in five children die before age five and one in eight women die from pregnancy-related complications, according to the UN Children’s Fund Photo: Nancy Palus/IRIN
Sierra Leone inaugurates free health care for women and children, but major gaps in health care services remain IRIN News April 27, 2010 More nutrition and health stories
Transferring drinking water from one pail to the next. People must pay the equivalent of up to $1 daily to buy clean water for drinking and cooking from vendors transporting water in jugs.Photo: Jefri Aries/IRIN
People in Jakarta's slums must pay nearly $1 per day for fresh water while living on less than $2 per day, and bath and wash clothes in murky gray water from fish ponds IRIN News April 16, 2010 More nutrition and health stories
Does international health aid reduce developing country government health spending? Yes IRIN News April 12, 2010
Maternal death rates drop around the world--down 40% since 1980. Six countries account for half of all maternal deaths David Brown Washington Post April 14, 2010
Campaign to eradicate polio makes real progress in countries most affected, Nigeria and India Celia W. Dugger New York Times April 6, 2010
Almost eight out of 10 people without access to both clean water and safe toilets live in rural areas; most are in Southern Asia. Photo: UNICEF Cambodia
The World Bank and other donors must do more to combat growing water shortages and poor sanitation in developing countries World Bank Independent Evaluation Group April 7, 2010 Unsafe water kills 1.8 million children worldwide IRIN News March 22, 2010 Eight out of 10 people without toilets in 10 countries IRIN News March 22, 2010
Only one man is left to help tuberculosis patients amid the rubble of Haiti's only TB sanatorium Ian Urbina New York Times February 5, 2010 (Factsheet: Haiti has the highest rate of TB in the Western Hemisphere) Education was also leveled by the quake in Haiti Marc Lacey New York Times February 13, 2010
Indonesia: Internet facilitates illegal kidney trade--Thomas sells kidney through internet website to pay for mother's hospitalization. IRIN News January 8, 2010