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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
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.
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 problems
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
Nigeria, once the worst-afflicted country in the world with an estimated 653,000 cases in 1989, appears to be free of guinea worm disease, which is a painful parasitic infection transmitted to humans through a water supply contaminated with guinea worm larvae. Photo: Vanessa Vick/New York Times
Campaign to eradicate guinea worm in hard-hit Nigeria may have worked Donald G. McNeil Jr. New York Times December 5, 2009 See more health stories
Africa population tops one billion BBC News November 18, 2009 Population explosion to stop Africa's attempt to attain MDGs AfriqueJet November 18, 2009