MOVE FORWARD WITH STRONG HEART

1-4. What do food shortages do to us?

From severe food shortages, people lose weight, their eyes go out of focus, and their skin loses moisture. Undernourishment arising from food shortages, in many cases, goes with malnutrition.  Malnutrition is a state of nutritional deficiencies in proteins, vitamins, iron, iodine, and so on because of meals which are neither large enough nor well balanced.  Iodine is a mineral which is contained in sea fish and sea weed.  Shortages of iodine cause cretinism, decrease in function of the thyroid gland, or thyroid gland tumors, in which the thyroid gland tries to collect iodine in the blood, and the neck gets swollen.  A lack of iron causes an anemia. Undernourishment with malnutrition affects internal organs.  The liver loses volume. It also causes a decrease in secretion of stomach acids.  It lowers the ability to absorb nutrients, and it causes diarrhea and dehydration.  People lose strength, and even slight sicknesses lead to death. Long term undernourishment slows children’s physical and mental growth.  For females, it influences child birth.  Stillbirths and early births happen more frequently.

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Copyright (c) Makoto Kurata, 2009