Giving Compass' Take:

• A new analysis from PATH discusses how to decrease the amount of stunting and the relationship between stunting and access to food and clean water. 

• How can organizations that are reporting on WASH and food access issues incorporate collaborative efforts to address stunting?

• Read about how nutrition is central to global development and the efforts put forth to invest in global health. 

Achieving major reductions in stunting may hinge not only on improved access to food, but on integrating programs to improve nutrition with efforts to increase access water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) services and to healthcare. A new analysis from the international nonprofits PATH – through its Defeat Diarrheal Diseases initiative and WaterAid underscores the importance of linking these programs, while providing a roadmap for countries looking to better coordinate these efforts.

Helen Hamilton, WaterAid’s senior policy analyst for health and hygiene, spoke to Malnutrition Deeply about this strategy:

Malnutrition Deeply: What motivated the release of this report?

Helen Hamilton: We know that the foundations for healthy childhood really include clean water, decent toilets and good hygiene. And those need to be combined with immunization and good nutrition. Far too many children are deprived of these components, which affects their health, their education and ultimately their life chances. The reason for launching this report was really that our modeling showed that if every child in the world had access to clean water, decent toilets and good hygiene, including the handwashing with soap component, alongside routine rotavirus immunization and other nutritional interventions, we could cut the rate of death from pneumonia and diarrhea by half.

Malnutrition Deeply: Can you talk more specifically about the potential impact this approach could have on stunting?

Hamilton: A couple of years ago there was research which estimated that direct interventions to address malnutrition, such as nutrient supplements or the exclusive breast-feeding components, can only reduce stunting by 20 percent in the worst-affected countries, even if they’re reaching 90 percent of the population in need.

So that means [improving] access to clean water, sanitation and hygiene along with these other measures in the different sectors plays a crucial part in reducing the remaining 80 percent of stunting.

Read the full article about stunting by Andrew Green at News Deeply