Determinants of malnutrition among children aged 0-5 years in northern Uganda

Abstract

Malnutrition among under-five children is one of the public health problems in developing countries especially Sub-Saharan Africa. In Uganda, many children are malnourished most especially in the Northern part of the country. Therefore, this study investigated the determinants of malnutrition among under five children from Northern Uganda using secondary data. Its specific objectives included; identifying the relationship between social factors, economic and demographic factors with malnutrition among under five children. Uni-variate and bi- variate analysis was applied on the data and frequency distribution tables were used to establish the background characteristics of the respondent as univariate analysis and Pearson’s chi-square test was used to measure the association between malnutrition and each of the selected independent variable as bivariate analysis. The study findings indicated that mother`s education and wealth index were statistically associated with malnutrition among under-five children. There was less exposure of children born by mothers with higher education status to malnutrition. Children born by rich mothers were less likely to be malnourished. However, other factors were not associated with malnutrition since the p-value was greater than 0.05 which made the stated null hypotheses for these factors true. Therefore, girl child education and women empowerment programs should be invested in much by the government and non-government institutions in order to curb or mitigate problem in the country most especially in Northern and South West of the country.