Publications

Under-nutrition is a major challenge facing children below the age of five years from middle-classhouseholds. Under-nutrition is a direct representation of poverty. Individuals from poor householdsare predisposed to poor living conditions that may result in diseases and poor health outcomes. Thisstudy was designed to investigate the factors contributing to under-nutrition in children below fiveyears in the Bushenyi district. The study was a cross-sectional study design. The findings showedthat the overall prevalence of under-nutrition was 11.64%, and underweight, wasting, and stuntingwere 10.76%, 4.99%, and 19.16%, respectively. The prevalence of stunting in the present study was19.16%, which means that one in five children in the Buramba ward was stunted due to chronicunder-nutrition. The etiology of under-nutrition in Buramba ward, Bushenyi municipality, ismultifaceted and interconnected. The nutritional status of children under five years is determinedby socioeconomic, cultural, household, maternal, and child-level factors. The effect ofsocioeconomic factors on underweight, wasting, and stunting is exhibited independently andmediated through maternal and child-level factors. It is logical to conclude that empowering womenas well as improving the socioeconomic status of households may contribute significantly toreducing morbidity and mortality from undernutrition. Although our study included only childrenunder five years of age, our findings can be considered to reflect the anthropometric status for thepopulation in Buramba ward in general, since the status of children under five can be considered agood gauge for population-based malnutrition. Therefore, awareness creation on complementaryfeeding practices and timely initiation at 6 months should be strengthened in the community.Nutritional interventions by the government and Ministry of Health to fight childhoodundernutrition should take into consideration policies or strategies that would empower women andaddress socioeconomic inequalities at the community leve