Stunted growth is a reduced growth rate in human development. It is a primary manifestation of malnutrition in early childhood, including malnutrition during fetal development brought on by the malnourished mother. According to the latest UN estimates, an estimated 165 million children under 5 years of age, or 26%, were stunted in 2011. More than 90% of the world's stunted children live in Africa and Asia, where 36% respectively 27% of children are affected. Once established, stunting and its effects typically become permanent. Stunted children may never regain the height lost as a result of stunting, and most children will never gain the corresponding body weight. It also leads to premature death later in life because vital organs never fully develop during childhood.
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Famous quotes containing the words stunted and/or growth:
“I think it is worse to be poor in mind than in purse, to be stunted and belittled in soul, made a coward, made a liar, made mean and slavish, accustomed to fawn and prevaricate, and “manage” by base arts a husband or a father,—I think this is worse than to be kicked with hobnailed shoes.”
—Frances Power Cobbe (1822–1904)
“Every child has an inner timetable for growth—a pattern unique to him. . . . Growth is not steady, forward, upward progression. It is instead a switchback trail; three steps forward, two back, one around the bushes, and a few simply standing, before another forward leap.”
—Dorothy Corkville Briggs (20th century)