"This document is written for local and international staff running nutrition programmes in emergencies, and for local, regional and national authorities and donors involved in such programmes. The note explains WHY nutrition programmes need to include early childhood development (ECD) activities to maximize the child’s development. It provides practical suggestions as to WHAT simple steps are necessary to create integrated programmes in situations of famine or food insecurity and it gives examples of HOW such integrated programmes have been established in other situations"
This briefing document reviews examples of the progress that Africa has made in reaching the Accelerated Action Towards Africa Fit for Children 2008 - 2012 as adopted by the African Union and Member States in the agreed actions related to Enhancing Life Chances and Child Survival and looks at what more needs to be done. The commitment, "Enhancing Life Chances", entails strengthening health systems to provide quality maternal and child health services; scaling up essential interventions to reduce maternal morbidity and mortality and reduce neonatal mortality; scaling up a minimum package of proven child health interventions; and supporting family and community based actions that enhance children’s health, nutrition and well-being including potable water, improved sanitation and hygiene, appropriate young child feeding practices and food security measures
This article "reviews interventions that affect maternal and child undernutrition and nutrition-related outcomes. These interventions included promotion of breastfeeding; strategies to promote complementary feeding, with or without provision of food supplements; micronutrient interventions; general supportive strategies to improve family and community nutrition; and reduction of disease burden (promotion of handwashing and strategies to reduce the burden of malaria in pregnancy). (The authors) showed that although strategies for breastfeeding promotion have a large effect on survival, their effect on stunting is small"
The Lancet, Vol 371, Issue 9610
This report gives the background to the Integrated child development services (ICDS) initiative, which takes a holistic approach to child nutrition, health and development and sees the first three years of life as crucial, before going on to explain the expansion in this 11th five-year plan in order to accelerate implementation for achieving the core objectives of the programme, especially to reduce the child malnutrition and help reduction in mortality rates. The plan seeks to address the challenges of issues such as the prevention and management of malnutrition, poor maternal and adolescent nutrition, gender discrimination, lack of nutrition and health education, and inadequate community participation in the programme
This article explores the "household practices that can affect neonatal health, from the perspective of caregivers and health workers; to identify signs in neonates leading either to recognition of illness or health-care seeking; and to ascertain the proportion of caregivers who recognize the individual items of the integrated management of neonatal and childhood illnesses (IMNCI) programme"
Bulletin of the World Health Organization, 84(10)