Hamid Yimam Hassen and Jemal Haidar Ali
Background: Malaria and under-nutrition are among the major causes of childhood mortality in Sub-Saharan Africa including Ethiopia. Although the synergistic relationship of malnutrition and infection are widely documented, the influence of under-nutrition on malaria attack is controversial. This study has addressed the contributory effect of wasting and underweight on malaria status of children.
Methodology: An unmatched case control study was employed to assess the influence of wasting and underweight on malaria among children in Ethiopia. A total of 621 sampled children were enrolled and allocated proportionally across the six randomly selected health centers. Children with confirmed malaria were enrolled as cases and for every confirmed malaria case; three controls that visited the facility for fever other than malaria were interviewed based on their order of visiting. Clinical data, anthropometric measurements and blood film was taken by trained personnel. The anthropometric data were converted into nutritional indices using the WHO Anthro software version 3.2.2 and exported to SPSS version 21 for cleaning and further analysis.
Result: The overall wasting was significantly associated with confirmed malaria cases. The odds of developing malaria was 2.4 times more among wasted than non-wasted children (AOR=2.440; 95% CI=1.146 to 5.197); and 1.7 times more among underweight children than the referent group (AOR=1.69; 95%CI=1.11 to 2.9).
Conclusion: Being wasted and underweight contributed to the magnitude of malaria and affected the health and nutrition related response. Therefore, integration of nutrition surveillance with malaria control program is essential