Thread by @ericbschneider

These tweets summarise the findings from a recent conference on child #stunting held at @LSEEcHist last September sponsored by @ESRC @cepr_org @LSEnews #globalhealth.

See this video for a summary:

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Here is also a full copy of the #stunting conference report for those who are interested in the details and in references to the most recent research currently being conducted: goo.gl/LcV1S2

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Context: 155 million children around the world are stunted. Stunted children are too short for their age because they experience slower growth because of poor nutrition and high rates of infections. #Stunting is concentrated in Africa and South and Southeast Asia today.

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Context (cont.): Stunted children perform poorly on cognitive tests, receive fewer years of schooling, have lower income as adults and are more likely to live in poverty. Eradicating stunting is a very important policy goal and is part of SDG Goal 2. un.org/sustainabledev…

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There were four main lessons from the conference about how to move #stunting research and policy forward to deal with this important global challenge.

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Lesson 1: #Stunting is not a recent phenomenon. Some currently developed countries had high levels of #stunting in the past (c.f. Japan in the graph below) and it took decades of strong improvements in economic development and health to eradicate #stunting.

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Lesson 2: We need more research on interventions in adolescence. Are the effects of child #stunting on health and development permanent, or could adolescence be a critical window for interventions to mitigate the effects of being stunted? doi.org/10.3945/ajcn.1…

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Lesson 3: Age matters. For most children, growth faltering occurs between 6 and 24 months and remains flat between 24 and 60 months. Associations between #stunting and wealth, income and parental education are stronger for children over 24 months. doi.org/10.1371/journa…

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Lesson 4: Interdisciplinary research and perspectives are vitally important. The causes of #stunting are multidimensional. To construct complete models or design experiments researchers need to consider medical, economic, social and cultural drivers of stunting.

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So those were our findings. If you want to learn more, please visit the conference website: sites.google.com/view/stuntingc…

Also get in touch if you have any ideas about #stunting or would like to be included in further discussions of the network.

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