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National Family Health Survey
India's demographic health survey 2019-21 reveals that 13 per cent of children were born prematurely, and 17 per cent with a low weight at birth, with air pollution contributing to the adverse birth outcomes. Researchers from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, International Institute for Population Sciences, Mumbai, and institutes in the UK and Ireland looked at the National Family Health Survey-5 and remote sensing data to analyse how exposure to air pollution in pregnancy impacted the delivery outcomes. The team found that an increased exposure to PM2.5 during pregnancy was related with a 40 per cent chance of low birth weight, and 70 per cent of premature delivery. Climate conditions, such as rainfall and temperature, were found to have a greater link with adverse birth outcomes. The study, published in the journal PLoS Global Public Health, also found that children living in the northern districts of India could be more vulnerable to the ambient air pollution. Measurin
About 77 per cent of children in India aged 6-23 months lack diversity in diet as suggested by the WHO, with the country's central region showing the highest prevalence of minimum dietary failure, a study has found. The states of Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh reported the highest levels of inadequate diversity in children's diets -- all above 80 per cent -- while Sikkim and Meghalaya were the only two to report an under-50 per cent prevalence. The World Health Organisation (WHO) suggests using the Minimum Dietary Diversity (MDD) score to evaluate the quality of a child's diet -- it is considered to be diverse if it contains five or more food groups, including breastmilk, eggs, legumes and nuts, and fruits and vegetables. Analysing National Family and Health Survey data from 2019-21 (NFHS-5), researchers, including those from the National Institute of Health and Family Welfare, found that the country's overall rate of minimum dietary diversity ...
Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, number of babies in India born with a low birth weight rose sharply -- by about three per cent, a new study has found. Babies born during the pandemic were also found to be at double the risk of having a low weight at birth. The increase in babies born with a low weight could impact the development of "human capital" in the long term, as these infants are known to often "struggle with school", corresponding author Santosh Kumar, an associate professor of development and global health economics at the University of Notre Dame, US, said. "Children who have lower birth weight as infants often go on to struggle with school and this limits their capacity to develop what economists often call 'human capital' -- the key knowledge and skills that will affect their ability to earn a good living and support themselves and their families," Kumar said. Roughly one in every four babies (3 crore) around the world are born with a low weight, which the World Health ..
Rajasthan minister Babulal Kharadi has asked people to have more children, saying there should be no problem as Prime Minister Narendra Modi will build houses for them. Kharadi, the tribal area development minister in the desert state, said it is a dream of the prime minister that no one will go to sleep hungry and without a roof over their head. "It is a dream of the prime minister that no one should sleep hungry and without a roof over their head. You give birth to lots of children. Pradhan mantriji will build your houses, then what is the problem?" Kharadi asked while addressing a public meeting in Udaipur on Tuesday. Kharadi has eight children -- four sons and as many daughters -- from two wives. The entire family lives in Neechla Thala village, about three kilometres from Kotda tehsil of Udaipur. Chief Minister Bhajan Lal Sharma shared the dais with the tribal area development minister on the occasion. The stage was set up for a "Viksit Bharat Sankalp Yatra camp" in Udaipur's
Women on average have more sex partners than men in 11 states and UTs but the percentage of men who had sexual intercourse with someone who was neither their spouse or lived with stood at 4 per cent, much higher than that of women at 0.5 per cent, according to the NFHS data. The National Family Health Survey which was conducted among 1.1 lakh women and 1 lakh men showed that the number of sex partners on average for women was higher than men in many states and Union territories. These states and UTs are Rajasthan, Haryana, Chandigarh, Jammu and Kashmir, Ladakh, Madhya Pradesh, Assam, Kerala, Lakshadweep, Puducherry, and Tamil Nadu. Rajasthan had the highest number of women who had on an average 3.1 sex partners as against the 1.8 for men. But the percentage of men who had sexual intercourse with someone who was neither their spouse or live-in partner, in the 12 months preceding the survey, stood at 4 per cent. For women, the number stood at 0.5 per cent. The National Family Health