A new paper published by the Imperial College of London, in the journal The Lancet has identified that poor nutrition could be responsible for creating a 20 cm height gap across nations. To put that in perspective, 20 cm represents an eight-year growth spurt in girls and six years for boys. 

A total of 65 million children across 193 countries took part in the study, which looked at weight and height as key measures of health. Adolescents from the Netherlands were found to be the tallest. Compared to Bangladesh, where a 19-year-old girl will be the same height as an 11-year-old from the Netherlands. A staggering gap! 

The researchers responsible for the study warned that a lack of good quality nutrition in childhood may lead to stunted growth and an increased risk of developing obesity. 

Data was analysed over a period of 35 years from 1985 to 2019. Large improvements in the height of children were found in China and Southeast Asia. In 2019, the average 19-year-old boy in China was 8cm taller than in 1985. Conversely, those in Sub-Saharan Africa have not seen any change in the height of their children. 

Shockingly, the height ranking for the UK has dropped 11 places, from the 28th tallest in 1985 to 39th tallest in 2019. Representing an average drop in height of almost 2cm. 

Senior author, Professor Majid Ezzati from Imperial’s School of Public Health said: “Children in some countries grow healthily to five years, but fall behind in school years. This shows that there is an imbalance between investment in improving nutrition in pre-schoolers, and in school-aged children and adolescents. This issue is especially important during the pandemic when schools are closed throughout the world, and many poor families are unable to provide adequate nutrition for their children.” They concluded that there should be more focus on providing adequate nutrition for school-aged children. This would, in turn, provide benefits to the children’s lifelong wellbeing. 

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