Odisha malnutrition deaths: Union health ministry team to visit Nagada today

Bhubaneswar, Aug 1: A five-member team of the union health ministry is scheduled to visit Odisha's Nagada village in Jajpur district today to take stock of the situation there following death of children due to malnutrition.

At least 20 children died due to malnourishment in Nagada village in mineral-rich Jajpur district in the last four months.

The team is expected to discuss the situation with the concerned authorities of Odisha government.

National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) has also asked the government to submit a report within 10 days on the situation in the village, inhabited by Juang tribes.

Nagada is situated on the hilltop in a dense forest under the Sukinda block. The children of three villages including Nagada and Guisala, are affected by malnourishment. The average household population is 8-9 members, who stay in thatched houses in unhygienic condition, depending on forest produce, with no drinking water. The villages have no road, clean water or electricity.

In Odisha, 45 per cent of under-five children suffer from chronic under-nutrition. Among them, tribal children bear maximum brunt with 57 per cent of the tribal under-fives being chronically undernourished, according to a UNICEF report. The situation among Odisha's rural tribal children aged 18-23 months is even more serious with the prevalence of stunting (low height for age) as high as 83 per cent, said the report.

OneIndia News

(With inputs from agency)