11 Million Children Affected Due To Iodine Deficiency: Dr.Salma Shaikh

Eminent pediatrician and the Dean of Faculty of Pediatrics, Liaqaut University of Medical and Health Sciences (LUMHS), Jamshoro, Professor Dr. Salma Shaikh said that Iodine deficiency has affected 11 million children in the world while not consuming Iodine was a reason associated with various mental issues reported of 43 million people

HYDERABAD,(UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 27th Feb, 2018 ) :Eminent pediatrician and the Dean of Faculty of Pediatrics, Liaqaut University of Medical and Health Sciences (LUMHS), Jamshoro, Professor Dr.

Salma Shaikh said that Iodine deficiency has affected 11 million children in the world while not consuming Iodine was a reason associated with various mental issues reported of 43 million people.

Talking to APP here on Tuesday, Dr. Salma Shaikh said that care is better than cure as such we have to invest more for taking preventive measures to reduce the financial burden of the government being incurred on curatives programs and keep the nation healthy through their life style.

She said that at present 40 percent women and 60 percent children were affected only in Sindh province due to iodine deficiency. Lack of awareness, wrong perceptions about iodine salt, non-implementation of laws and inadequate performances of concerned management on government and industrial side were the main reasons behind poor usage of iodine salt, she added.

Dr. Salma Shaikh said that the deficiency of iodine produce number of disorders in human and mostly affected groups are children, pregnant women, ladies and adult population. She further informed the Iodine deficiency causes mental retardation, poor physical growth, deaf and dampness, short stature and goiter.

Its mild state hampers social and education development of the children.

It creates goiter and reduce child's movement due to energy deficiency. During pregnancy it could cause the loss of pregnancy, intra-uterine growth retardation, intrauterine death, miss carriage and deaf and dumbness of off springs and the most simple and scientific method of avoiding such situation was using iodine salt at mass scale, she suggested.

She said that all the salt producing factories, producing salt without iodine must be encouraged and made bound for producing salt with iodine. Besides the awareness about breast-feeding must be accelerated with a view to avoid deficiencies in the children and mothers, she added.

She said that the government has launched different multidimensional health projects for the betterment of the health of the people but keeping in view the low literacy rate in the country awareness at mass level was very much essential not only to motivate the people to avail the benefits and follow the guidelines but also to make these projects more success, Salma added.

She said that iodine was one of the mineral chemicals, which is required for human development, intellectual development and smooth reproductive functioning in the human body. She said that inadequate central, provincial management, lack of industrial compliance in quality control and unawareness about use of iodine salt have been identified as main factors behind poor usage of iodine in the country.