PMID- 33076897
OWN - NLM
STAT- MEDLINE
DCOM- 20210514
LR  - 20210514
IS  - 1471-2458 (Electronic)
IS  - 1471-2458 (Linking)
VI  - 20
IP  - 1
DP  - 2020 Oct 16
TI  - Deciphering disparities in childhood stunting in an underdeveloped state of 
      India: an investigation applying the unconditional quantile regression method.
PG  - 1549
LID - 10.1186/s12889-020-09559-8 [doi]
LID - 1549
AB  - BACKGROUND: Unacceptably high rate of childhood stunting for decades remained a 
      puzzle in the eastern Indian state of Bihar. Despite various programmatic 
      interventions, nearly half of the under-five children (numerically about 10 
      million) are still stunted in this resource-constrained state. DATA AND METHODS: 
      Using four successive rounds of National Family Health Survey (NFHS) data spread 
      over more than two decades and by employing unconditional quantile regressions 
      and counterfactual decomposition (QR-CD), the present study aims to assess 
      effects of various endowments as well as returns to those endowments in 
      disparities in childhood stunting over the period. RESULTS: The results show that 
      although the child's height-for-age Z-scores (HAZ) disparity largely accounted 
      for differing levels of endowments during the earlier decades, in the later 
      periods, inadequate access to the benefits from various development programmes 
      was also found responsible for HAZ disparities. Moreover, effects of endowments 
      and their returns varied across quantiles. We argue that apart from equalizing 
      endowments, ensuring adequate access to different nutrition-centric programmes is 
      essential to lessen the burden of childhood stunting. CONCLUSION: The state must 
      focus on intersectoral convergence of different schemes in the form of state 
      nutrition mission, and, strengthen nutrition-centric policy processes and their 
      political underpinnings to harness better dividend.
FAU - Ghosh, Saswata
AU  - Ghosh S
AUID- ORCID: 0000-0001-9337-683X
AD  - Demography and Population Health Expert, Centre for Health Policy (CHP), Asian 
      Development Research Institute (ADRI), Patna, 800013, India. 
      ghosh.saswata@gmail.com.
AD  - Institute of Development Studies Kolkata (IDSK), Kolkata, India. 
      ghosh.saswata@gmail.com.
FAU - Sharma, Santosh Kumar
AU  - Sharma SK
AD  - Centre for Health Policy (CHP), Asian Development Research Institute (ADRI), 
      Patna, 800013, India.
FAU - Bhattacharya, Debarshi
AU  - Bhattacharya D
AD  - Lead- State Health Systems, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, New Delhi, India.
LA  - eng
GR  - INV-010497/GATES/Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation/United States
PT  - Journal Article
DEP - 20201016
PL  - England
TA  - BMC Public Health
JT  - BMC public health
JID - 100968562
SB  - IM
MH  - Child
MH  - *Growth Disorders/epidemiology
MH  - Humans
MH  - India/epidemiology
MH  - *Nutritional Status
MH  - Regression Analysis
PMC - PMC7574201
OTO - NOTNLM
OT  - Bihar
OT  - Childhood stunting
OT  - Counterfactual decompositions
OT  - India
OT  - Unconditional quantile regression
COIS- Authors do not have any competing interest.
EDAT- 2020/10/21 06:00
MHDA- 2021/05/15 06:00
PMCR- 2020/10/16
CRDT- 2020/10/20 05:39
PHST- 2020/07/29 00:00 [received]
PHST- 2020/09/17 00:00 [accepted]
PHST- 2020/10/20 05:39 [entrez]
PHST- 2020/10/21 06:00 [pubmed]
PHST- 2021/05/15 06:00 [medline]
PHST- 2020/10/16 00:00 [pmc-release]
AID - 10.1186/s12889-020-09559-8 [pii]
AID - 9559 [pii]
AID - 10.1186/s12889-020-09559-8 [doi]
PST - epublish
SO  - BMC Public Health. 2020 Oct 16;20(1):1549. doi: 10.1186/s12889-020-09559-8.