Morbidity and Mortality for Children Under Five Years Old caused By Malnutrition in Khartoum State

Abstract

The study investigates under five children morbidity and mortality caused by malnutrition in Khartoum state and the relation between risk factors (full term, pre term, diseases {diarrhea, pneumonia and malaria}, environmental factors, maternal education and socio-economic status. The data used is secondary data collected from ministry of health covering the years 2000 up to 2005. Results were presented in tables and figures by using factor analysis technique. The data were entered and analyzed by using SPSS program. The research comes to the conclusion that: - Under five children malnutrition is the major cause of morbidity and mortality among this age group with high levels. - The high levels of morbidity and mortality is less in the infant group (0-1) and the reason beyond that is no doubt breast feeding. - Frequent pneumonia infection during winter seasons. - Diarrhea infection during fall is frequently detected. - The year 2001 gains the highest levels in morbidity and mortality resulted from malnutrition. - The year 2005 has the less morbidity and mortality cases for the following reasons: o Maternal education showed improvement during the last years in the state. o Economic and socio-economic status is growing rapidly. o The medicaments became available in almost all the hospitals and clinical centers in Khartoum state. o The government of the state started to establish projects and programs to serve Khartoum state environmental and public health situations such as “Khartoum Free of Malaria initiative”. The conclusion and recommendations were made in an attempt to give statistics and solutions to help eradicate malnutrition. The research recommends more efforts to be offered by both the governmental bodies and NGOs. Further, establishing new NGOs that concentrate in developing public health. Besides, introduce health education and encourage studies in this field will help eradicate these diseases. Also, the government should do its best to make the medicaments to all malnutrition diseases available in all hospitals and clinics.