Acute respiratory infection among Nigeria's under- five children : a quest for the cause
Abstract
Acute respiratory infections (ARI) are the main cause of morbidity and represent one of the main causes of death among Nigerian children younger than 5 years of age. In this connection, the Nigerian 2008 DHS reports the prevalence of ARI among the under-five population to have been at 3%. As the cause for this morbidity is neither specified nor documented, the aim of this study therefore, was to establish and document the cause/causes of this prevalence among under-five children from different zones of Nigeria. The study employed the Logistic Regression Model to identify the variables that have a bearing on the acute respiratory infection status of the under-five population of Nigeria. It was elicited from the 2008 OHS Report that the North East Zone had the highest prevalence of ARI among the under-five children in Nigeria as it was reported at I 0%, followed by the South South Zone at 6.6%. The South West Zone recorded the lowest at about I. 7% at the end of the survey. The conclusion is that the use of biomass fuel and the presence of very young children in the
same rooms were associated with the development of ARI among under-five children. However, environmental factors, such as the climatic conditions that promote certain types of vegetation in some zones in addition to the issue of the very erratic and inadequate electricity supply do contribute to the health problems of the under-fives in Nigeria.
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