Extra 6.7 million kids under 5 could experience the ill effects of squandering due to COVID-19: UNICEF

Extra 6.7 million kids under 5 could experience the ill effects of squandering due to COVID-19: UNICEF

Overview

  • Post By : Kumar Jeetendra

  • Source: PTI

  • Date: 28 Jul,2020

Another 6.7 million kids under the age of five round the globe might suffer from squandering this year on account of this socioeconomic effects of the COVID-19 outbreak, the UNICEF warned on Tuesday.

According to the UNICEF, in India, there continue to be about 20 million children below five decades old that are suffering from squandering.

As stated by the International Hunger Index 2019, wasting among children in India rose from 16.5 percent in 2008-2012 to 20.8 percent in 2014-2018.

Wasting is a life threatening kind of malnutrition, making children too weak and thin, and sets them at greater chance of dying, inadequate growth, growth and learning.

According to the UNICEF, before the COVID-19 pandemic, 47 million kids have been wasted in 2019.

Another 6.7 million kids below the age of five might suffer with squandering and become dangerously propounded in 2020 as a consequence of the socioeconomic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, the UN children’s agency said.

“Without urgent action, the worldwide number of kids suffering from squandering could reach nearly 54 million on the course of this entire year. This could bring international squandering to levels not seen that this century,” it stated.

Quoting an investigation of the Lancet, the UNICEF said 80 percent of those children are in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia.

“More than half will be in South Asia alone,” it stated.

It stated the Lancet evaluation finds that the incidence of wasting among children under the age of five might rise by 14.3 percent in low-income and low nations this season on account of the socio-economic effect of COVID-19.

“It has been seven weeks since the very first COVID-19 instances were reported and it’s increasingly obvious that the consequences of this pandemic are causing greater harm to children than the disorder ,” said UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Foresaid

Critical nutrition services and supply chains are disrupted. Food costs have jumped. Because of this, the standard of children’s diets has gone and malnutrition rates will appear,” she explained.

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