Health officials discuss challenges of child nutrition

Leading nutritionists from across the Commonwealth met in London, UK, to address major causes of malnutrition and ways of improving the health of children under five in member countries.

The objective of the meeting held at the Commonwealth Secretariat’s headquarters, Marlborough House, on 26 March 2007 was to review different studies and highlight areas that need more emphasis to improve child health.

“We still need to do more to reduce child mortality. This meeting is one of the activities we have programmed this year to address that,” said Peggy Vidot, an Adviser with the Health Section of the Secretariat.

The forum brought together officials involved in research and clinical work from Africa, Asia and the UK to review research done and the current status of nutrition strategies for children below five years of age.

“Within the Commonwealth we have a duty to work towards improving nutrition for children because we have about 60 per cent of all child mortality globally,” stated Ms Vidot.

“We hope to put together best practices that we have in the Commonwealth, and publish and make them available to our member countries.”

Zulfiqar Bhutta, President of the Commonwealth Association for Paediatric Gastroenterology and Nutrition (CAPGAN), echoed Ms Vidot’s remarks, saying: “Looking at the current status of about 10.6 million children less than five years old dying globally, about 60 per cent takes place in countries of Sub-Saharan Africa and Asia, with 40 per cent in the Commonwealth.”

Mr Bhutta added that in order to address this problem, there’s a need to try and scale up efforts in addressing causes of under-nutrition, such as poverty.

The participants agreed to establish a Commonwealth group to carry out an in-depth study of all aspects of under-5 nutrition in the Commonwealth.

The meeting was organised by the Health Section in collaboration with CAPGAN.

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