Loss of ancestral food practices and perception of its effect on children's health among Inga indigenous grandmothers, Nariño, Colombia.

OBJECTIVE: Novel foods and dietary practices, a lack of available land, and displacement by armed conflict have affected the ancestral food traditions practiced by the Inga community in Aponte, in Nariño, Colombia. These factors have led to problems with food security and malnutrition, which have impacted the growth and development of children. Therefore, this study is aimed at identifying the changes in ancestral food practices reported by Inga grandmothers, and the possibility of recuperating them in order to improve children's health. METHOD: A qualitative study was conducted that included 24 mothers with children under five years old and 25 grandmothers in nine Inga communities. Participants were recruited using snowball sampling. Free listing was used to identify changes in food patterns, and semi-structured interviews were conducted with 20 grandmothers to delve deeper into the subject. A translator of the Inga language facilitated communication, and the Inga researcher validated the translation using audio recordings. Each interview was transcribed and categorized for the purpose of analysis, using the NVivo 12 software. RESULTS: Free lists showed changes from a corn-based to a rice-based diet and a wide variety of non-ancestral food products. According to the grandmothers, "tiendas" have replaced traditional foods with those that are easy to prepare, which are attractive to mothers as well as to the children because of their flavor. Ancestral practices such as grinding, peeling, and log cooking are being abandoned. Government programs and daycare have incorporated new food that compete with traditional ones, with no clear evidence of an intercultural approach. Added to this is the dismissal by young mothers of the knowledge held by their grandmothers, which hinders the continuation of traditions. CONCLUSIONS: The findings suggest that it is necessary to prevent the loss of the Inga food culture, and policies need to be created that promote and protect ancestral knowledge and that help to regain the value of the "chagra" farming system, with the support of elders, authorities who are recognized by the community, and government technicians, as recommended by the grandmothers who participated in this study.

Correction to: socioeconomic inequalities in survival of children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia insured by social security in Mexico: a study of the 2007-2009 cohorts.

Following publication of the original article [1], the author reported her name has been erroneously spelled as Blanca E. Pelcastre. The full name is Blanca E. Pelcastre-Villafuerte.

Socioeconomic inequalities in survival of children with acute lymphoblastic leukemia insured by social security in Mexico: a study of the 2007-2009 cohorts.

BACKGROUND: Although acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) 5 years survival in minors has reached 90%, socioeconomic differences have been reported among and within countries. Within countries, the difference has been related to the socioeconomic status of the parents, even in the context of public health services with universal coverage. In Mexico, differences in the mortality of children with cancer have been reported among sociodemographic zones. The Instituto Mexicano del Seguro Social (IMSS), the country's main social security institution, has reported socioeconomic differences in life expectancy within its affiliated population. Here, the socioeconomic inequalities in the survival of children (< 15 years old) enrolled in the IMSS were analyzed. METHODS: Five-year survival data were analyzed in cohorts of patients diagnosed with ALL during the period 2007-2009 in the two IMSS networks of medical services that serve 7 states of the central region of Mexico. A Cox proportional risk model was developed and adjusted for the socioeconomic characteristics of family, community of residence and for the clinical characteristics of the children. The slope of socioeconomic inequality of the probability of dying within five years after the diagnosis of ALL was estimated. RESULTS: For the 294 patients studied, the 5 years survival rate was 53.7%; the median survival was 4.06 years (4.9 years for standard-risk diagnosis; 2.5 years for high-risk diagnosis). The attrition rate was 12%. The Cox model showed that children who had been IMSS-insured for less than half their lives had more than double the risk of dying than those who had been insured for their entire lives. CONCLUSIONS: We did not find evidence of socioeconomic inequalities in the survival of children with ALL associated with family income, educational and occupational level of parents. However, we found a relevant gradient related social security protection: the longer children's life insured by social security, the higher their probability of surviving ALL was. These results add evidence of the effectiveness of social security, as a mechanism of wealth redistribution and a promoter of social mobility. Extending these social security benefits to the entire Mexican population could promote better health outcomes.