World's nutrition profile changes

BOSTON, Aug 03, 2005 (United Press International via COMTEX) -- While nutritional status has improved worldwide during the past 50 years, scientists say new nutrition-related problems have also emerged.

In an article recently published in The Journal of Nutrition, Eileen Kennedy, dean of the Friedman School of Nutrition Science and Policy at Tufts University, described the effects of global demographic, epidemiological, and nutritional transitions.

She said an unusual situation has developed in which food insecurity exists side by side with problems of obesity and chronic nutrition-related diseases, even in the same household.

A former acting undersecretary at the United States Department of Agriculture, Kennedy said, "While problems of under-consumption and poor nutritional status continue to exist, increasingly problems of diet (and) chronic diseases are emerging as significant public health issues globally."

She said many of the world's populations have been left in the midst of an obesity crisis that co-exists with food insecurity and under-nutrition.

"Unfortunately," she wrote, "the message that the global nutrition profile is changing hasn't reached policymakers, and they need to be aware that it is occurring."