Twin dangers of malnutrition and obesity affecting health and food security: WHO

NEW DELHI: The world is facing a new nutrition reality with at least one in three countries facing the twin burdens of malnutrition and obesity in the same communities and even within the same families, said a new report published in The Lancet.

One in three low and middleincome countries is affected as they adopted unhealthy diets of affluent countries that are high in calories, fat, sugar and salt, particularly in South Asia, Sub-saharan

Africa, East Asia and the Pacific, experts led by the World Health Organisation said.

At least 2.3 billion children and adults are overweight, and more than 150 million children are stunted, according to the WHO, with these issues overlapping in individuals, families, communities and countries, which calls for a new approach to nutrition to improve the food quality and supply to ensure low- and moderateincome countries and households have sustainable, safe, affordable and healthy diets.

“All societies are suffering from the many forms of malnutrition - from undernutrition to overweight- obesity. These are now twin dangers affecting many low and middle income countries. It is not enough for nutrition science to state what healthy diets are. Agriculture and food systems must deliver those diets without distortions that damage health,” said Dr K Srinath Reddy, president of the Public Health Foundation of India and one of the two India authors of the Eatlancet Report 2019.

Nationally representative data from India shows there are wide sub-national variations in obesity, which ranges from 0.6% in Bihar to 12.2% in Puducherry among women, and from 0.5% in Bihar to 7.5% in Goa among men.

“Ultra-processed foods in particular pose a great danger. They must be eliminated while promoting healthy foods through policies ranging from crop diversity to price subsidies,” said Reddy. “We can no longer characterise countries as low-income and undernourished, or high-income and only concerned with obesity,” said lead author of the report Dr Francesco Branca.