A healthy and fruitful lifestyle depends on proper nutrition. The current approach to women's nutrition places an excessive amount of emphasis on pregnancy. Despite the significance of stages, such as the first 1000 days of a child's life, which start at conception and continue through the first two years and adolescence, I cannot overstate the necessity of a lifelong approach to nutrition. There has to be a greater focus on the bigger nutritional issues that affect women and girls.
According to the most recent National Health and Family-5 (NFHS) (2019-21) survey, anemia affects more than half of women between the ages of 15 and 49. Additionally, compared to men, who make up 16.2% of the population, 18.7% of women have a low BMI. The poll also shows how prevalent obesity is, with women being more likely than males to be obese or overweight (24.6%).
Beyond maternal and infant outcomes, nutrition for girls and women is a gender equity issue; it requires prioritizing overall quality of life for their personal well-being as well as the well-being of their families and communities and for attaining their full potential as citizens of society and country.
Girls and women who eat healthily have a higher quality of life, stronger cognition that helps them do better in school, college, and the workplace, as well as greater immunity to diseases and illnesses. In my three decades of practice as an obstetrician and gynecologist, I have seen undernourished adolescents develop into undernourished women, resulting in unfavorable pregnancy outcomes like low birth weight infants, anemia, and other problems. This continues a pattern of health issues that span generations.
Despite the fact that there are several programs and plans for women, tackling malnutrition in girls and women completely remains out of reach. Current maternity benefits, postpartum care, early childhood care support, as well as education and empowerment programs, are unquestionably right measures.
The urgent requirement for an all-hands-on-deck response to the issue of women's nutrition calls for a comprehensive strategy and coordinated measures across numerous relevant sectors.
I want to emphasize the importance of this complex situation and issue a call to action. In all areas that have an impact on nutrition, including education, employment support, social protection benefits, improved counseling, health care, and better sanitation facilities, to name a few, we need stronger and more nuanced policy protection for girls and women. We must acknowledge that women's nutrition is a highly complicated issue that interacts with several actors, organizations, and social norms and that no one agency or group can resolve on their own.
