Nutrition gap in children, urban-rural

Abstract

OBJECTIVE: To analyze the nutritional situation of children under five years old from both urban and rural areas of Colombia. METHOD: Analytical study, based on cross-sectional data, collected from ENSIN-2015. The sample consisted of 12,256 children aged between 0 and 4 years old. We calculated the prevalence ratios (PR) with their respective 95% confidence interval (95%CI). PR were assessed by binomial regression models with malnutrition or overweight as the dependent variable and geographic area as the explanatory variable. We used context variables to adjust the estimated PR and control the confounder within. RESULTS: Acute malnutrition (weight-for-height) had a prevalence of 1.6%, while overweight had a 5.6% rate. No differences per geographic zone in the weight-for-height indicator were found. Stunted growth – chronic malnutrition – was higher in the rural area (PR = 1.2; 95%CI 1–1.53; p = 0.050). Prevalences adjusted by variables related to structural, social and economic developement showed that both the household chief’s educational level and the food insecurity of the area account for malnutrition. CONCLUSION: The height-for-age indicator works better to establish development level. Measures against coverage, relevance and quality of education and access to food can harm the nutritional status of the children.

‘Mens sana in corpore Sano’: Home food consumption implications over child cognitive performance in vulnerable contexts

“…Contrary to expectations, results showed that there were no significant differences between rural and urban groups in this index. However, we note that a similar result has been also reported in studies conducted with rural and urban school children in Peru and Colombia ( Aquino et al, 2014 ; Bermúdez et al, 2020 ). Furthermore, in a study conducted with a sample of American Indian families, urban rather than rural groups exhibited higher levels of food insecurity ( p = 0.05; Tomayko et al, 2017 ).…”