http://www.poverty.com/
http://www.worldhunger.org/articles/Learn/world%20hunger%20facts%202002.htm#hunger_meaning_quiz
Synopsis: 2012 World Hunger and Poverty Facts and Statistics
Around the world there are many people living in poverty and are dying of starvation. Hunger Notes has put together a few statistics to help inform the world of these desperate and hard times.
Analysis: Many people believe that hunger is just when you're hungry and your stomach growls but in fact it is so much more.
Hunger is a term which has three meanings (Oxford English Dictionary 1971)
- the uneasy or painful sensation caused by want of food; craving appetite. Also the exhausted condition caused by want of food
- the want or scarcity of food in a country
- a strong desire or craving
World hunger has become inevitable, but we can do something to help lower the rate of hunger in the world. "About 25,000 people die every day of hunger or hunger-related causes, according to the United Nations. This is one person every three and a half seconds..." a quote from poverty.com. World hunger is a very important issue that needs to be taken more seriously and addressed more. Most charities and organizations ask for very little donations, some as little as pennies a day. A few facts from poverty.com to help understand hunger and malnutrition: a strong desire or craving
World hunger refers to the second definition, aggregated to the world level. The related technical term (in this case operationalized in medicine) is malnutrition.1
Malnutrition is a general term that indicates a lack of some or all nutritional elements necessary for human health (Medline Plus Medical Encyclopedia).
There are two basic types of malnutrition. The first and most important is protein-energy malnutrition--the lack of enough protein (from meat and other sources) and food that provides energy (measured in calories) which all of the basic food groups provide. This is the type of malnutrition that is referred to when world hunger is discussed. The second type of malnutrition, also very important, is micronutrient (vitamin and mineral) deficiency. This is not the type of malnutrition that is referred to when world hunger is discussed, though it is certainly very important.
[Recently there has also been a move to include obesity as a third form of malnutrition. Considering obesity as malnutrition expands the previous usual meaning of the term which referred to poor nutrition due to lack of food inputs.2 It is poor nutrition, but it is certainly not typically due to a lack of calories, but rather too many (although poor food choices, often due to poverty, are part of the problem). Obesity will not be considered here, although obesity is certainly a health problem and is increasingly considered as a type of malnutrition.]
Many people, including myself, did not know that malnutrition is not only lacking nutrition, but obesity too. World hunger is something that needs to brought more to the forefront and we need to do everything we can to help prevent it so that innocent children, parents, grandparents, friends etc don't continue to die.
