The Hindu : Tamil Nadu / Chennai News : “More children in southern States suffer from anaemia”

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Monday, Apr 14, 2008
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Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu - Chennai

“More children in southern States suffer from anaemia”

Staff Reporter

Two-day seminar discusses status of the young child

Governments have failed to address issue of nutrition of young children: participants
Providing special childcare programmes for migrant workers suggested

— PHOTO: R.RAGU

IN DISCUSSION: Mina Swaminathan of the MSSRF with K. Shanmugavelayutham, of TN-FORCES, at the regional consultation meeting on the status of the young child in Chennai on Saturday.

CHENNAI: Though the overall health indicators of children in southern states are comparatively better than those in the north, it has been found that more children in the south suffer from anaemia.

This was one of the points of discussion at the two-day south Indian regional-level consultation on the status of the young child in the southern region, including Andaman and Nicobar Islands and Puducherry.

The discussion, which concluded here on Saturday, was organised by National Forces and TN-FORCES.

Participants at the consultation felt that governments had failed to address the issue of nutrition of young children.

They expressed concern that more children weighed lower than they should for their age. Mina Swaminathan of M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation chaired the discussion on Saturday.

Indrani Mazumdar from the Centre for Women Development Studies, New Delhi, pointed out that rapid urbanisation and migrant women population in the unorganised sector had become a cause for concern.

It was necessary to provide childcare services to children of migrant workers on the site. Participants at the meeting attributed the imbalances to lack of quality services under the Integrated Child Development Scheme, absence of special schemes for migrant workers and lack of support systems for mothers to consider exclusive breastfeeding during the first six months after childbirth.

Recommendations

The meeting made several recommendations, including a two per cent financial allocation from the GDP for early childhood care and development, providing special childcare programmes for migrant workers, ensuring minimum infrastructure in anganwadis, training for anganwadi workers and making early childhood education free and compulsory.

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