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Malnutrition is a category of diseases that includes undernutrition and overnutrition. [14] Undernutrition is a lack of nutrients, which can result in stunted growth, wasting, and underweight. [15] A surplus of nutrients causes overnutrition, which can result in obesity or toxic levels of micronutrients.
Polyphagia or hyperphagia is an abnormally strong, incessant sensation of hunger or desire to eat often leading to overeating. [1] In contrast to an increase in appetite following exercise, polyphagia does not subside after eating and often leads to rapid intake of excessive quantities of food.
Kwashiorkor, or edematous malnutrition, like many other malnutrition diseases, is indirectly assessed using anthropometry. [9] Kwashiorkor is a subtype of severe acute malnutrition (SAM) characterized by bilateral peripheral pitting edema.
Hunger is a sensation that motivates the consumption of food. The sensation of hunger typically manifests after only a few hours without eating and is generally considered to be unpleasant. Satiety occurs between 5 and 20 minutes after eating. [1] There are several theories about how the feeling of hunger arises. [2]
Treatable childhood diseases are another set which have disproportionately higher rates in poor countries despite the availability of cures for decades. These include measles, pertussis and polio. [56] The largest three poverty-related diseases (PRDs)—AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis—account for 18% of diseases in poor countries. [56]
In the field of hunger relief, the term hunger is used in a sense that goes beyond the common desire for food that all humans experience, also known as an appetite. The most extreme form of hunger, when malnutrition is widespread, and when people have started dying of starvation through lack of access to sufficient, nutritious food, leads to a ...
The term inanition [2] refers to the symptoms and effects of starvation. Starvation by outside forces is a crime according to international criminal law and may also be used as a means of torture or execution. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), hunger is the single gravest threat to the world's public health.
There are many causes of food insecurity. The most important ones are high food prices and disruptions in global food supplies for example due to war. There is also climate change, water scarcity, land degradation, agricultural diseases, pandemics and disease outbreaks that can all lead to food insecurity.