Does your child live to eat hot dogs and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches? Do you worry about him not getting the proper nutrients so he will grow and develop in a healthy manner? Chances are he will not suffer from malnutrition if you provide him with healthy fruits and snacks that will meet his nutritional needs.
Have you ever wondered how much food your child needs to stay healthy? Of course you don’t want him to be hungry, nor do you want him to be overweight. You definitely want to provide a good balance so he will grow at a normal rate of speed. However, if you have a picky eater on your hands, you may worry about the amount of nutrients that he is ingesting and if he is getting all that he needs in order to develop and grow both mentally and physically. Maybe you’re worried that your child could suffer the effects of malnutrition because he eats so little. Is this possible when nutritious food is offered on a daily basis?
Hunger and Malnutrition
We all feel hungry at times. Hunger is the body’s way of letting us know that it needs energy. Once that need is met by the ingestion of food, the hunger subsides until the body once again needs to be re-energized.
Malnutrition is completely different, although it often goes hand in hand with hunger. Children will suffer the effects of malnutrition if they don’t have the proper nutrients for health, growth and development. Children can suffer mild to severe malnutrition over varying lengths of time, either long or short term. This causes them to have a weak immune system and they will often suffer from a variety of illnesses. If malnutrition is very severe, it can cause death.
There are millions of people world wide who don’t have access to sufficient food to ward off malnutrition. According to the World Health Organization, one in every seven people world wide suffers from hunger; 153 million of those people are children.
Chronic Hunger and Malnutrition
Chronic hunger and malnutrition cause a wide range of health problems. Children who are constantly hungry for long periods of time will be underweight and their growth may be stunted. Being underweight has been cited by the World Health Organization as one of the top ten health risks world wide. 27% of children under five years of age are underweight and the majority of those children are between the ages of six month and two years.