Assignment Task

 

Introduction

Since rapid urbanisation is emerging as a major global problem, the worldwide population of urban poor is expected to rise (Abdi, Wadugodapitiya, Bedaf and George, 2018). According to Murage, Schofield, Wekesah, Mohamed, Mberu and Ettarh (2014), it has been estimated that 881 million people in the developed world such as Sub-Saharan Africa and Southern Asia, were living in slums in 2014, as contrasted to 792 million in 2000 and 689 million in 1990. The number has risen, since 2000, by around 9 million a year. In the least developed nations such as Malawi, Myanmar and Cambodia, and almost one-third of the world's population of the urban population live in slums, including hundreds of millions of children (Unger, 2013). Throughout the REHDA Property Forum in 2017, an industry expert outlined an important point about the emergence of slums in Malaysian urban areas that could endanger the health of slum communities if we continue ignoring it and do not take any initiative to improve their well-being (Bhatt, 2017).


Urban slums are described by poverty, poor structural integrity of buildings, overcrowding, poor access to water, sanitation and other resources as well as challenging living conditions that directly and indirectly affect their communities (Abdi et al., 2018). The same article stated that children were reported as one of the groups most vulnerable to health problems in urban slums by several participants. Diarrhoea (reported in 17 interviews) and malnutrition (reported in 12 interviews) were the most commonly reported childhood health issues, accompanied by acute respiratory infections (mentioned in 11 interviews). Unger (2018) reported that despite the severity of this issue, the major outcome of slum life on the health of children and adolescents is very little known by the societies.

When children run or play around the polluted areas associated with inadequate waste management methods there is a high possibility that children will insert their infected fingers into their mouth ( Moya, Bearer and Etzel, 2004). Thus, children living in such conditions are always at a high risk of developing undernutrition and other health problems (Unger, 2013). According to Zaman, Goswami and Hassan (2018), malnourished children, particularly those with extreme acute malnutrition, have a higher risk of death from common childhood illness such as diarrhoea, pneumonia, and malaria. It is also supported by another study from  Goudet, Griffiths and Madise (2015) that thousands of children die every day in urban slum areas from communicable illnesses due to insufficient water and sanitation provision and a lack of access to health care. Globally, malnutrition became the main factor of deaths among children in slum areas under five years old (Black et al., 2013). The overall picture of child health status in slum areas is alarming. In general, health is a critical issue for individuals living in the slum areas of every state or region.

The combination of high population density and poor living conditions, such as poor sanitation and inadequate access to health care, makes slums an important risk to public health in general (UN Development Programme, 2015). The environmental conditions of slum dwellers are of importance in order to ensure a decent quality of life for slum children. The importance of socioeconomic conditions for health has been recognized since the early centuries (Braveman, 2011). Lower socioeconomic status is usually correlated to the risk of having premature mortality due to non-communicable diseases (Sommer et al., 2015). Other studies found that housing conditions, health, and social support in poor urban settings had significant relationship with quality of life according to (Zainal et al., 2012).

The UN Special Rapporteur on Extreme Poverty and Human Rights reported that the social protection scheme in Malaysia is very ineffective and incompetent. In fact, only about 1% of Malaysia's children get benefit from the Department for Social Welfare's Children's Financial Assistance Scheme and only about 3,000 families benefit from the childcare fee assistance scheme (Bahri, 2012).

Consequently, this study will identify the challenges encountered by parents living with urban poverty, compounded by children suffering from common health problems in urban slums and this paper also addresses the impact of slum life on children’s health.

Research Problem

Addressing issues is urgently needed on the nutritional status of slum children, maternal and child health in the slum (Zaman et. al., 2018). In addition, there are some recommendations to address the problem for example, health education and education on health-seeking behavior regarding sick children, focusing on maternal education and increasing women’s decision-making autonomy over household resources (Gelu1 Edris Derso and Abebe, 2018). In this report, the alarming rate of undernutrition, stunting and waste among children <5 years of age living in urban slums reiterates the synergistic association between common infections and malnutrition (Goya, Lukhmana, Dixit and Singh, 2017). Mass sanitation programmes are strongly recommended, especially for slum dwellers, as this community can be easily accessible for any action (Ferdous, Das, Ahmed, Farzana and Malek, 2014).It is important to further explore new data outlets that can offer geographical, temporal and social perspectives into slums (e.g., crowdsourced information and open data) (Mahabir, Crooks, Croitoru and Agouris, 2016). To ensure their safety, 15 percent of Malaysians have been forced to miss meals. These urgent issues can be linked with what slums children in Malaysia faced. It was confirmed that 28 percent of children aged twelve to twenty-three months in Putrajaya suffer from stunting or less than average height growth in the National Health and Morbidity Survey 2016. And this is only two per cent away from the World Health Organisation declaring it a health emergency (WHO). Nationally, 20.7 percent of children under the age of five are stunted because of financial constraints, with about one in four facing mild to extreme food malnutrition. This growth loss is closely related to hunger, which reduces access to sufficient quantities and quality food, clean water and sanitation, and quality primary health care. Poverty and stunting are also well-known risk factors, including cognitive functions, for impaired child development. Recycling food menus in a two-week period has demonstrated increased adoption by most kids in most schools (Santiago, 2017). As the budget increased from RM0.45 to RM0.80 per child, the nutritional quality of the food served improved. The parents surveyed wanted the service to continue to avoid malnutrition during school hours for children from low-income households(Muda, Sundaran and Gen, 2019.

 

Research Objectives
This study seeks
1. to identify the common illnesses suffered by children of urban slums areas
2. to identify the social, economic and environmental challenges experienced by parents of ill children in urban slums areas. 
 

Research Questions 
1. What are the common illnesses suffered by children of urban slums?
2. What are the social, economic and environmental challenges experienced by parents of ill children in urban slums areas?

 

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  • Posted on : March 08th, 2019

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