Do vitamin A deficiency and undernutrition still matter?

Underlying these causes are factors such as household food insecurity (due to poverty or other reasons), inadequate care and feeding practices, unhealthy household environments and inadequate health services.1 How these factors inter-relate with each other is shown on page 64. Being undernourished for a long time can lead to stunting. In addition to its most obvious effects on stature (height), stunting has implications for the health and development of children, including their ability to learn. It can also lead to an increased risk of chronic diseases, such as heart disease or diabetes, in adulthood. Although stunting is declining, the rate of decline is too slow. There are now major global initiatives in place to improve the nutritional status of young children – the group most vulnerable to undernutrition and in whom the effects of undernutrition are greatest. Two of the main initiatives are the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) movement and the 1,000 Days Partnership, which focuses on the period of that encompasses pregnancy and the first two years of the child’s life. These initiatives have similar aims. Broadly, these are: Ab id in E rn a/ H KI