Everyday a fortunate amount of us wake up knowing that we will have three meals. We do not worry about how we are going to get food. The only thing we may worry about is if we have the supplies we need to make our homemade meal or if a trip to the store will be needed. Or we may worry if we have time to make a homemade meal or if we should just get some takeout. However, this is not the case with millions of people around the world, and more specifically children. Over 800 million people suffer from malnutrition. It is believed that 5 million children worldwide die from malnutrition every year.
This morning when I arrived to work there 2 kids in my office, both complaining of stomachaches. My first question was, have you had breakfast today? To which these students replied, No. I don’t often see these students in my office, but it made me think about the students I used to see frequently at another school, on the poorer side of town. I would have students coming in almost on a daily basis asking for something to eat because they didn’t eat at home. Mostly because it was near the end of the month, and they had ran out of food. Many times when we think of malnourished children, our first thought is children in Africa, or other underdeveloped countries. Yet some children here in the United States also suffer from malnutrition.
In the article Shocking Need: American kids go hungry, it is stated that “As many as 17 million children nationwide are struggling with what
Fortunately there are programs that assist families in crisis and can help to feed the children of the United States; however the number of hungry children is growing. Child hunger in the United States has been described as an increasingly complex problem and has been called the “silent epidemic.” (Goldstein, 2009)
A. How many of you are worried about where your next meal will come from? Are you unsure of how you’re going to purchase next week’s groceries or what you will be feeding your children for dinner tonight? This probably isn’t something most of you think about from day to day. When you are hungry, you eat. It’s easy for you to grab a sandwich, order a pizza, or run through the drive thru when you are on the go. However, there are many families, not just in other countries, but here in the United States as well, that are going hungry every day. According to kidshealth.org, a child dies from malnutrition and related causes every 6 seconds.
Putting food on the table may become a difficult task putting the family at risk for hunger (Martin, 2011).
The St. Francis Xavier Secondary School DECA Chapter advocated and fundraised for the leading cause for over 3 million child deaths annually: malnutrition. The campaign, entitled “Mission4Malnutrition (M4M)”, is a not-for-profit campaign which is dedicated to eliminating hunger within impoverished communities internationally. It strives to bring awareness to malnutrition, which can be defined as “the lack of sufficient nutrients which are normally obtained through food.” There are countless consequences of malnourishment, including deteriorating immunity, susceptibility to rare illnesses, as well as the physical inability to attend school. In order to eradicate malnutrition as well as its detrimental effects, M4M has partnered with two charities: Sharelife Canada and ACF International.
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) reports 16.7 million children under the age of eighteen live in a household where consistent access to adequate amounts of nutritious food for a healthy life is not obtainable. This is called food insecurity. Although this is harmful to any individual, it has major implications for children. Nutrition establishes
It was difficult to read that countless millions of federal dollars and many of our country's most successful efforts to halt the spread of childhood hunger and starvation have recently been withdrawn. And as a result, this problem of childhood hunger is not getting better but is actually getting worse. The most recent estimates compiled by the USDA in 1999 indicate that 36.2 million Americans live in food-insecure households, which means that their access to adequate and safe food is limited or uncertain. This too is very disturbing information.
Starvation is a global concern that affects millions of children every day. It is also the top cause of death for children under the age of four, it takes the lives of more than 3.5 million children every year. Furthermore, without a treatment,
Johnny gets home from school and makes his way straight to the kitchen. He is hungry and wants a quick, yummy snack, but when he opens up the fridge, there is nothing there. Now he has to wait until his mom brings home dinner at six o'clock. Can you imagine what it would be like to experience this every day? Unbelievable, right? Well, for many children and families, this is their reality. What could possibly cause this, what are the effects, and what are people doing to help these poor families? A large number of children do not have access to fresh and nutritious food, due to lack of supermarkets or living on food stamps. This lack of healthy food can affect childhood development immensely and can lead to obesity and other diseases. Many people are doing what they can to help, like opening community gardens, connecting farms, restaurants, and hotels with food banks, and organizing food drives.
Many people do not realize that hunger and malnutrition is a problem that many Americans face on a daily basis. Maybe, we are failing to realize that our country is not perfect, but if we don’t try to do anything then more and more children will die. The problem with child hunger is that the United States may not face as dramatic problems with hunger as that of other countries, but
“The agriculture Department estimated in 1999 that twelve million children were hungry or at risk of going hungry.” She proclaimed. The cause of that could be because parents who can’t afford or find service programs to park their vacationing children in front of the television, lock the door, and go to work hoping for
The one thing that we all need is Food. In the U.S. and all over the world there are many people who lack the funds to buy food and millions of starving children. Anna states in her essay that most kids have trouble getting food when school is out because that is the primary source that provides breakfast and lunch. “Summer is really ground zero in the battle to keep kids fed.” (pg 224)
Needy children may or may not eat breakfast, which is considered the most important meal of the day. Sometimes, these children have eaten more nutritiously with oatmeal, milk, and fruit, whereas others have eaten white-flour pancakes with syrup or sugar-laden cereal with milk, water, or nothing else. Even though egg whites, whole grain breads, fruits, and low-fat milk are better choices, they may not be available to them. Many families need education about nutrition and its effects on their children and families. By lunchtime, most poor children’s bodies are depleted and in need of another energy provider, even if they had a breakfast in the first place.
A large problem of childhood poverty is malnutrition. Since these children are growing up in poverty, many of the parents have a hard time supplying food for their kids. Surprisingly, there
Malnutrition is a serious health concern for people that are residing in Haiti, especially the children. Malnutrition has a serious effect on the body, “children [that] suffer from acute malnutrition are at a great risk for severe morbidity and mortality” (Roller, Gray, Previl, Forrest, 2014, p. 1094). There is no reason for these children to be suffering from malnutrition when there is such a simple solution to fix malnutrition. According to UNICEF the percent of children that are underweight and is considered moderate to severe is 11.4
The ever-growing problem of malnutrition plagues our world in the nations that cannot handle such a weight. Malnutrition is a dangerous state where a human is so deprived of the nutrients vital for survival that they are subject to death. The most important factors of malnutrition in countries that may be in a state of development are food insecurity water availability and food quality. For any type of solution to work, it is a guarantee that at least one of these must be taken into consideration. Currently 20 million people on the brink of starvation in the most undeveloped countries. In Somalia, Yemen, South Sudan, and Nigeria this problem is most relevant and this problem is always on the rise.1 A new report by the WFP shows that world hunger is on a large rise due to internal/external conflicts and climate change.2 According to The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World Report 2017, some 155 million children aged under five are stunted or too short. In addition to this, it seems that while 52 million suffer from wasting, meaning their weight is too low for their height, an estimated 41 million children are now overweight.3 Anaemia among women and adult obesity are also cause for concern. More factors that are a main cause of malnutrition is big agricultural struggles, conflict leading to farming unproductivity, and improper distribution of food