In certain African countries, Libya for example, a mother must have five children to assure that one reaches the age of fifteen. In Northeast Brazil, 48 percent do not survive the first year of life; by the age of four, 63 percent have succumbed. In parts of Southeast Asia, 40 percent of the children die of disease in their first four years. This is a proportion of deaths not reached in the United States until the age of sixty (Berg, 1967).
These statistics were devastating! Yet, what bothered me the most is that 45 years later the statistics hasn't had a drastic change.
In the United States, though nutritional foods are available in abundance, we still opt to eat foods that no good for us. Though developing nations are malnourished due to a lack of nutrition, our country suffers from malnutrition due to..... empty calories?
References
Berg, A. D. (1967). MALNUTRITION AND NATIONAL DEVELOPMENT. Foreign Affairs, 46(1), 126-136.
Wow!!! We sometimes take for granted such things as this. When you think about people who are malnourished and don't have the means to eat saddens me deeply. My question is, what can we do to stop it? How do we help? Just questions I ask myself from time to time.
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