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. 2022 Jun 28;14(13):2685.
doi: 10.3390/nu14132685.

Global Burden of Nutritional Deficiencies among Children under 5 Years of Age from 2010 to 2019

Tingting Yue  1   2 , Quanquan Zhang  1   2 , Guangdi Li  1   2 , Hong Qin  1   2
Affiliations

Global Burden of Nutritional Deficiencies among Children under 5 Years of Age from 2010 to 2019

Tingting Yue et al. Nutrients. .

Abstract

Under-five years of age is a critical period for children's growth and development. Nutritional deficiency during this period is associated with wasting, underweight and stunting. We aimed to conduct an epidemiological study using data derived from the GBD2019 to found the global distribution and changing trends of nutritional deficiencies among children under 5 years old, as well as the correlation between social development status and nutritional deficiencies. Nutritional deficiencies in children under 5 years has been substantially improved in the past decade; however, the progress has been unevenly distributed globally. The incidence and DALY rate decreased with the increase of socio-demographic index. In 2019, the incidence (51,872.0 per 100,000) was highest in Central Sub-Saharan Africa and the DALY rate (5597.1 per 100,000) was the highest in Western Sub-Saharan Africa. Among five subcategories of nutritional deficiencies in children under 5 years, vitamin A deficiency accounted for the largest proportion of incident cases (100,511,850, 62.1% in 2019), while the proportion of DALYs caused by protein-energy malnutrition was the highest (9,925,276, 62.0%). Nutritional deficiency in some countries remains worrisome, for whom policies guarantees and sustained efforts to control nutritional deficiencies are urgently needed.

Keywords: children; global burden; human development index; nutritional deficiencies; socio-demographic indexes.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Global burden of nutritional deficiencies in children under 5 years of age. (a) Incidence rate of nutritional deficiencies in children under 5 years of age in 2019; (b) DALYS rate of nutritional deficiencies in children under 5 years of age in 2019. (IR: Incidence rate; DR: DALYs rate; EAPC: Estimate annual percentage change; C.A.R.: Central African Republic; Dem. Rep. of Congo: Democratic Republic of the Congo; B. Faso: Burkina Faso; and Syr.: Syrian Arab Republic).
Figure 2
Figure 2
Nutritional deficiencies in children under 5 years of age caused by five different subcategories of nutritional deficiencies in 21 GBD regions. (a) Number of incident cases of five subcategories of nutritional deficiencies. (b) Number of DALYs cases of five subcategories of nutritional deficiencies.
Figure 3
Figure 3
Nutritional deficiencies in children under 5 years of age caused by five different subcategories of nutritional deficiencies in five SDI regions. (a) Number of incident cases of five subcategories of nutritional deficiencies. (b) Number of DALYs cases of five subcategories of nutritional deficiencies.
Figure 4
Figure 4
The correlation between socio-demographic index and incidence or DALY rate of nutritional deficiencies, 2010–2019. The correlation between socio-demographic index and incidence (a) or DALY rate (b) of nutritional deficiencies among 21 GBD regions and five SDI regions. The correlation between socio-demographic index and incidence (c) or DALY rate and (d) of nutritional deficiencies among 204 countries and territories.
Figure 5
Figure 5
The EAPCs of nutritional deficiencies at global, regional and national level. (a) The EAPC of nutritional deficiencies incidence from 2010 to 2019, both sexes, by region and by causes; (b) The EAPC of nutritional deficiencies DALYs rate from 2010 to 2019, both sexes, by region. The correlation between EAPC and (c) of nutritional deficiencies and DALYs rate in 1990 and (d) HDI in 2019. The circles represent countries that were available on HDI data. The size of circle is increased with the cases of nutritional deficiencies cases. The ρ indices and p values presented in (c,d) were derived from Pearson correlation analysis.
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