Children of pastoralists, from polygamous homes most hit by malnutrition in Kano — Study

Experts have said that cultural and feeding practices in local polygamous households In Kano will need further investigation to understand the association between polygamy had severe malnutrition.

In a new study, experts found that children between the ages of 12 and 23 months old, those who came from households rearing domestic animals and those from polygamous households were associated with increased risks of being severely malnourished.

In addition, this study to identify risk factors for severe malnutrition in this high-burden malnutrition region of Nigeria indicated that parental education and being on the family diet were associated with decreased risks for being severely malnourished.

For the study, the researchers compared the baseline socio-demographic and household-level risk factors in a cohort of 1011 children aged between six and 59 months who either had severe acute malnutrition (SAM) or were well-nourished children. The 2020 study was in the Journal of Tropical Paediatrics.

Among these children enrolled at Murtala Muhammed Specialist Hospital and the Ali Akilu Specialist Hospital, the largest proportion of children with SAM were aged between 12 and 23 months, while those who were well-nourished were aged between six and 12 months.

Despite the majority age group of children with SAM being older than the well-nourished group, the study reported that a significantly higher proportion of children with SAM were predominately on breast milk and semi-solid foods when compared to well-nourished children.

Almost half (47.3 per cent) of fathers of children with SAM were not formally educated when compared to 28.0 per cent of well-nourished children, and this difference was statistically significant. Similarly, a larger proportion (63.6 per cent) of children with SAM came from polygamous households when compared to those in the well-nourished group (49.9per cent).

A significantly higher proportion of children with SAM also came from households who reared animals, and being from a polygamous household was associated with significantly increased odds for SAM when compared to being from a monogamous household. Domestic animal rearing was also associated with increased odds for SAM.

The researchers said there was a need to develop optimally complementary feeding nutrition programmes and promote adult and general education in the community, including further investigation into cultural and feeding practices in local polygamous households to understand the association between polygamy with SAM.

They declared, “Our association of SAM with polygamy should, however, be interpreted with caution, as local cultural feeding practices within polygamous households might be responsible for this and not necessarily the practice of polygamy.”

Severely malnourished children have a significantly increased risk of ill-health and are at risk of an untimely death. In 2018, the Nigerian National Nutrition and Health Survey indicated that around 1.5 per cent of all Nigerian children under the age of five are severely malnourished and the greatest number resides in North-Western Nigeria.

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