New study co-authored by a UWC researcher has found that stunting and wasting are the main contributors of mortality among children across the world. Image: Adobe Stock

A major global study co-authored by a researcher from the University of the Western Cape (UWC) has found that poor growth in early childhood continues to claim hundreds of thousands of young lives each year, highlighting the persistent toll of child undernutrition despite decades of global efforts to address it.

Published in The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health, the report shows that child growth failure remains one of the leading causes of illness and death among children under five worldwide, responsible for nearly one in five deaths in this age group.

Using data from the Global Burden of Disease Study 2023, which tracks illness, deaths and lost years of healthy life across more than 200 countries, including South Africa, from 1990 to 2023, researchers examined how child growth failure is affecting children’s health worldwide.

Researchers found that in 2023 alone, child growth failure, including stunting (too short for age), underweight and wasting (too thin for height), was linked to an estimated 880,000 deaths among children under five, accounting for nearly one in five deaths globally. Overall, these conditions were responsible for about 18% of all illnesses and deaths in this age group worldwide.

Growth failure in children accounted for 79.4 million disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) – a measure that combines years of life lost due to early death and years lived with illness. One DALY equals one year of healthy life lost. Researchers found that children whose growth falls below World Health Organization (WHO) standards are far more vulnerable to preventable but deadly infections such as diarrhoea, pneumonia, malaria and measles.

UWC researcher: Osaretin Christabel Okonji. Image: Supplied

One of the collaborators on the global study is Osaretin Christabel Okonji, from the School of Pharmacy at the University of the Western Cape, who is set to graduate in April after completing her PhD. As a senior collaborator with the Global Burden of Disease, a research project coordinated by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington, Okonji played a key role in the latest report. She contributed critical feedback and helped draft and revise major sections of the paper, including the introduction, methods, results and discussion.

Together with researchers from around the world, the team found that despite years of global efforts to address child growth failure, progress has been slow and the health burden remains high.

“This report is therefore crucial, as it provides policymakers and health professionals with evidence-based insights to design targeted interventions that can reduce child mortality and improve overall child health outcomes,” said Okonji.

The report shows that among the different forms of poor growth, being underweight has the greatest impact, contributing to more than 570,000 deaths and 52.2 million lost years of healthy life. This is followed by wasting, which was linked to 428,000 deaths and 39.2 million lost healthy years, while stunting accounted for 373,000 deaths and 33 million lost healthy years.

Okonji, based in Cape Town, completed her undergraduate studies in microbiology with honours at Ambrose Alli University, Ekpoma, Nigeria. She described being part of the international collaboration as “an incredible opportunity”.

“The most exciting part of contributing to this research was seeing how data from around the world comes together to provide a comprehensive picture of child health, and understanding the scale of impact that well-targeted interventions can have. It has been an invaluable experience, reinforcing how research can directly inform policies and strategies that make a real difference in children’s lives worldwide,” she said.