Assessment of Nutritional Status of School Children in Makurdi, Benue State
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.3923/pjn.2009.691.694Keywords:
Assessment, height, nutrition, school children, weightAbstract
This study was conducted to assess the nutritional status of school aged children (6-17 years) in Makurdi, capital of Benue State-Nigeria. Compared to NCHS/WHO standard, mean BMI (body mass index) of school children in Makurdi was inferior at all ages. The prevalence rate of undernutrition was (50.66%) and schools located in the slum parts of Makurdi (C.A.C wadata and L.G.E.A Wurukum) recorded the highest rate of undernutrition with (78.33%) and (73.33%) respectively. Males recorded a relatively high rate of undernutrition 162 (57.44%) than females 142 (44.65%). The study reveals that the average of school child in Makurdi is undernourished. Poor nutrition of children do not only affects the cognitive development of children but also likely to reduce the work capacity in future.
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2009 Asian Network for Scientific Information
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
