Nutrition the Primary Factor in Determining Lifelong Health in Children
Most new parents understand instinctively that newborns are needy little
people who must be nurtured and cared for, and one of the ways that we
do that is by feeding them properly. Nutrition has always been important, per se, for newborns so they grow to be healthy toddlers, and that seems self-evident.
But
a new book by journalist Roger Thurow says that the first 1,000 days of
a child's life are critical in ensuring that he or she will achieve
maximum health over the course of their lifetime.
As reported by
NPR's Allison Aubrey, Thurow's book, "The First 1,000 Days: A Crucial
Time for Mothers and Children – and the World," chronicles how, for
millions of women around the world, it is extremely difficult to ensure
that their children get proper nutrition during this crucial period
because the resources and infrastructure simply don't exist.
Thurow
travels to the western highlands of Guatemala, where women there cannot
even afford to eat the fruits and vegetables that are locally grown.
In addition, he writes, they have a hard time dealing with parasites
and other pests, as well as a chronic lack of clean water.
In
rural Uganda, Thurow encountered young women in a region where the
infant mortality rate is unusually high. Basic essentials are hard to
find and the people there must make liberal use of mosquito netting in
order to protect themselves from malaria.
Thurow also traveled to
India, which is modernizing but still has a great many regions where
poverty is rampant and women are pressured to bear more children than they can realistically support.
'If we want to shape the future...'
But
he also visited regions inside the United States – such as Chicago,
were parts of the city are so riddled with crime, death and murder
soldiers are safer in war zones like Afghanistan. There, despite the
affluence and abundance of most of Chicago, women have limited access to fresh produce
that is affordable to them. Women here are often obese because they
subsist on a diet high in processed foods that are equally high in
calories and contain few micro nutrients.
Aubrey writes:
The
stories are eye-opening. And, as Thurow weaves together the women's
narratives, the point he helps us understand is this: The first 1,000
days of a child's life — from conception through the second birthday –
are incredibly deterministic.
It's best summed up, as Thurow
points out, by the words of Susan Ejang,a midwife he met in a Ugandan
village who counsels young women. "The time of your pregnancy and first
two years of life will determine the health
of your child, the ability to learn in school, to perform a future job.
This is the time the brain grows the most," Thurow quotes Ejang as
telling the women.
In his book Thurow writes: "If we want to
shape the future, to truly improve the world, we have 1,000 days to do
it, mother by mother, child
by child, for what happens in those 1,000 days through pregnancy to the
second birthday determines, to a large extent, the course of a child's
life, his or her ability to grow, learn, work, succeed and by extension,
the long term health, stability and prosperity of the society in which
that child lives."
70 percent malnutrition rates
That
said, what happens when kids don't get the nutrition they need to get
started off in the right direction? Very often, Thurow noted, kids don't
develop properly. They're smaller than they should be and often more
susceptible to certain diseases.
"It's really revealing. And kind
of in the process of the reporting and following these moms and
children in India, Uganda, Guatemala and Chicago to kind of draw global
comparisons, but then also to show the commonalities and things. And you
really see the impact of stunting," he in an interview
with Aubrey, who was guest-hosting "The Diane Rehm Show."
In some regions Thurow visited, child malnutrition and stunting rates approached 70 percent.
You can read a transcript of the interview here.
Sources:
NPR.org
TheDianeRehmShow.com
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