Nutrition Month 2020 to Focus on Stunting

The National Nutrition Council Region 7 is gearing up for the annual observance of Nutrition Month 2020 in July in Central Visayas

Carrying the theme, “Batang Pinoy SANA TALL… Iwas Stunting, SAMA ALL!,” this year’s nationwide celebration of the 46th Nutrition Month focuses on the nutrition problem of stunting.

The World Health Organization (WHO) defined stunting as the impaired growth and development that children experience because of poor nutrition, repeated infection, and inadequate opportunities to learn and play.

Children are considered stunted if their height-for-age is more than two standard deviations below the WHO Child Growth Standards median.

Across the world, around 162 million children under five years old were affected by stunting in 2012.

Among the country-members of the Association of Southeast Asian (ASEAN) nations, Filipinos are the second shortest people in the region, reported by the ASEAN DNA Center in 2014.

In the Philippines, there are high incidences of stunting among children under five, with levels remaining unchanged over the years, pointed out by the Philippine Plan of Action for Nutrition (PPAN) 2017-2022. In Central Visayas the numbers are at two out of five children below five years old are too short for age according to the 2015 National Nutrition Survey.

According to Dr. Parolita Mission, regional nutrition program coordinator of NNC Region 7, stunting has serious short-term and long-term consequences on children, affecting the process of health and human capital development.

“Some of these consequences include poor physical growth, increased childhood risk of infection and mortality, poor cognitive and motor development, and decreased learning capacity and school performance. These can negatively affect other aspects of life later on, such as productivity, wages, and reproductive health,” she said.

Because one of the most direct causes of stunting is inadequate nutrition, NNC Region 7 emphasizes the importance of good nutrition in the First 1000 Days in preventing stunting in early childhood and in producing healthier, taller and brighter children.

The First 1000 Days of life starts from conception and up to the second birthday of the child. This is a critical window of time that sets the stage for a person’s intellectual development and lifelong health. It is a period of enormous potential, but also of enormous vulnerability.

In the pre-pregnancy stage to birth or 270 days of the First 1000 Days, NNC Region 7 recommends pregnant women to have at least four prenatal visits in three trimesters, take 180 tablets of iron-folic acid supplementation, and observe balance protein-energy dietary supplementation.

From birth to six months, or 180 days of the First 1000 Days, mothers are advised to exclusively breastfeed their infants.

From the older stage of infancy and toddlerhood, or 550 days of the First 1000 Days, mothers are encouraged to observe age-appropriate complementary feeding with continued breastfeeding and micronutrient supplementation.

“Well-nourished children in the First 1000 Days are 10 times more likely to overcome the most life-threatening childhood diseases, complete 4.6 more grades in school, more likely as adults to have healthier families, and earn 21 percent more in wages as adults,” Mission said.

For more information about the 46th Nutrition Month celebration in July, visit the NNC Region 7’s webpage, and follow updates on Facebook.  (by Ms. Nancy Cudis-Ucag, Proprietor, the Memoriter & VP for Social Media, MIND 7)