RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Prevalence and socioeconomic determinants of the double burden of malnutrition in mother–child pairs in Latin America and the Caribbean
JF BMJ Nutrition, Prevention & Health
JO BMJ Nutrition
FD BMJ Publishing Group Ltd
SP 263
OP 270
DO 10.1136/bmjnph-2022-000489
VO 5
IS 2
A1 Hannah Susann Otten
A1 Paraskevi Seferidi
YR 2022
UL http://nutrition.bmj.com/content/5/2/263.abstract
AB Background The double burden of malnutrition (DBM), which refers to the coexistence of overnutrition and undernutrition among populations, households or individuals, is a growing problem in low/middle-income countries. The Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) region has been particularly affected by the DBM, following a nutrition transition and a rapid increase in overweight, obesity and diet-related disease, while high levels of undernutrition persist. This study aims to describe the prevalence of four different DBM definitions in mother–child pairs across nine LAC countries and investigate the socioeconomic determinants of overweight mothers with at least one stunted child (SCOM).Methods We used cross-sectional data from the Demographic and Health Surveys for all analyses. We used descriptive statistics to obtain prevalence rates and conducted multiple logistic regression analyses to investigate the association between SCOM households and socioeconomic determinants, including wealth index, maternal education, place of residency and whether the mother was working, adjusted for a range of variables.Results Overweight/obese mothers with at least one anaemic child were the most common type of DBM, with a prevalence of 19.39%, followed by SCOM with a prevalence of 10.44%. Statistically significant socioeconomic predictors of SCOM were households with a lower wealth index, lower maternal education and living in rural areas.Conclusion This study showed that the overall prevalence of most DBM definitions examined was high, which points to the need for urgent interventions in the LAC region. The unique set of socioeconomic predictors of SCOM identified in this study calls for future double-duty policies that simultaneously target food affordability, nutrition education and access to healthy food.Data are available in a public, open access repository. All data are available through the Demographic and Health Surveys (DHS) Programme at www.dhsprogram.com.