Nutrition and acute respiratory infection[ARI]

ABSTRACT

Seven hundred and sixty children, under 5 years of age were followed up for two years and data collected indicate the following nutritional status. 22% have normal nutrition, 54% have mild malnutrition, 17% have moderate malnutrition and 7% have severe malnutrition. It was observed that significantly greater proportion of severely malnourished children had poor housing facility and did not receive childhood immunization. Thee incidence of ARI with normal and mild malnutrition was [6.46 per child per year. However, this incidence was essentially the same as that for children with moderately severe and severe malnutrition [6.56 per, child per year]. Thus, the results indicate that malnutrition did not correlate with increased overall incidence of ARI. The impact of malnutrition on hospitalised cases indicated that about half of these admitted cases had associated illnesses, mostly Diarrhoea or Measles. Case fatality rate [CFR] in normal children was essentially similar to that of children with mild malnutritions. CFR of children with severe malnutrition [7.54%] has been observed to be significantly higher than either normal or those with mild malnutrition