Study: 93 lakh More Children to Suffer from Wasting during 2020-2022

A new study has been released recently that has provided estimates for the number of children under 5 years that are likely to be affected by wasting, stunting, and post Covid-19 impact.

Key Points

• As per the study, an additional 93 lakh children under the age of 5 are estimated to suffer from wasting, around 26 lakh more children will suffer from stunting and around 1.68 lakh additional under-five deaths will be there in the first 3 years of the post-COVID-19 world.
• The study has been prepared by assessing the combined effects of health, economic, and food systems disruptions on various forms of maternal and child under-nutrition between the years 2020 and 2022.
• This study has been authored by Jonathan Akuoku from World Bank, Saskia Osendarp from Micronutrient Forum, Robert Black, Lawrence Haddad from Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, and many others including some from IFPRI.
• The study provides estimations for 3 scenarios — pessimistic, optimistic, and moderate.
• As per the study, 1.68 lakh additional deaths are projected in sub-Saharan Africa (57,200) and South Asia (38,900).
• The moderate scenario projects an additional 2.1 million pregnant women with any anemia in the 118 countries in 2020-2022 in comparison to the year 2019.
• The additional cases of anemia in women during pregnancy will be resulting in $79 million in lost productivity.
• An extra $1.2 billion per annum will be required to overcome the impacts of COVID-19 on child and maternal under-nutrition.

The report is in the preprint stage and is being considered for publication in the Journal Nature Research.