Underweight children underweight nation [Archives:2006/944/Opinion]
By: Mohammes Al-Qadhi
It seems our plight in scoring low rates in various aspects of development will continue. We are backsliding in all aspects of life; in media freedom, transparency, and good governance, poverty etc. The only field in which we are progressing is the degradation and backsliding. Every now and then, we read scaring reports about the situation in the country, anticipating the breakdown, collapse and even fragmentation of the state by the coming ten years unless a miracle takes place. The scenario is really frightening.
Last Tuesday, the UNICEF released its report on the situation of the children suffering from malnutrition worldwide. According to the report, Yemen still suffers from one of the highest rates in the world for poor nutrition among children under five years old. Around 46 percent or let us say almost half of the children are underweight, being vulnerable to various diseases.
This means that Yemen has made slight progress toward the UN's eight “Millennium Development Goals”, aimed at eradicating extreme poverty and hunger by 2015. The UNICEF report said the average annual rate of reduction for underweight children in Yemen between 1990 and 2004 was a mere minus 3.6 percent.
Of course, there are several reasons for malnutrition including poverty, disease, and weak maternal health care, lack of diet variety and others.
The UN agency says the solutions can be as simple as a capsule of vitamin A costing just a few cents delivered during immunization – a program currently saving around 350,000 lives per year by boosting immune systems. And fortifying staple foods with key nutrients like iron and iodine is a proven way to protect millions of children against damaging deficiencies and developmental delays. This means that it is not a matter of financial resources being pocketed by rampant corruption. It is rather of care about the future of the nation.
But, what does it mean that half of the children of the country are plagued with malnutrition and underweight?
These children of today are the leaders of the country tomorrow; it is they who are going to run the country. Imagine that around three million children are bridled with undernutrition. They are, of course, unhealthy. Unhealthy people can not learn effectively and hence will not be hale and sound to run their country. Unhealthy people can never think smartly and take right decisions. Some might look at the issue in a very simply way. But, it is that serious and needs adequate emergency planning and response. Having physically and intellectually sound and strong people is a must for making a good and healthy nation. Underweight people certainly means underweight nation; diseased and disabled people produces nothing but crippled and handicapped nation. It is unfair to find ourselves obliged to even import human resources to run the country and that the bad governance of today will continue to cripple the country's potentials on the long run.
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