Recent trends in malnutrition in developing regions: Vitamin A defi ciency, anemia, iodine defi ciency, and Vitamin A defi ciency, anemia, iodine defi ciency, and child underweight

摘要

The research reported here, commissioned by the Micronutrient Initiative, was carried out in the Department of International Health and Development at the School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine, Tulane University. Its aim is to describe progress made in controlling micronutrient deficiencies, and to provide a benchmark on current prevalences of vitamin A deficiency, anemia, iodine-deficiency disorders, and child underweight as a measure of general malnutrition. The results and extensive supporting database—which can be made available to researchers for further analysis—provided the basic information for the recent publications of the Micronutrient Initiative, with UNICEF, of Vitamin and Mineral Deficiency: A Global Progress Report [1], and for national damage assessment reports for some 80 countries. This special section of the Food and Nutrition Bulletin gives full details of data sources, analytical methods, and results in terms of prevalences and trends by regional groupings, and “best guess” estimates for individual countries for 2000.