Nutrition knowledge and practices in children under two years of age in Huila, Angola

Abstract

Background: The 2021 UN report indicated 149 million children under 5 years suffering malnutrition. African continent has the highest prevalence of stunting. Angola has a persistent nutritional crisis. Improving child-feeding practices is essential to ensure good nutrition. This is the preliminary analysis of baseline data of MuCCUA trial aimed to study household Caregiver’s (C) knowledge and practices regarding nutrition of children under two years of age in two communes of Huila, Jamba and Libongue. 381 caregivers were interviewed. A bivariate analysis of the sociodemographic variables was carried out and differences between communes were evaluated with a Chi square test. To identify socioeconomic factors associated with good knowledge and practices we did forward logistic regressions. Poisson regressions with robust variance were performed to calculate the incidence ratio and 95% confidence intervals. Results: 98.2% C. were women, 69.6% were 20-39 years old and 45% had no education. In Libongue the caregivers had a lower educational level (p < 0.05) and a lower socioeconomic level (p < 0.05) compared to Jamba. Only 27% of households had a drinking water tap and only 20% had latrine. 36.2% had high nutrition knowledge and 37% had good practices. 50% caregivers considered important to breastfeed immediately after birth but only 36% breastfed immediately after birth. In Jamba, 48% of the children stopped being breastfed within a year, vs 23% in Libongue (p < 0.05). The number of people in the house (RI 1.167 CI: 1.167-1.276) and high level of knowledge (RI 2.02 CI: 1.3-3.1) were factors associated with good practices. Conclusions: The percentages of good knowledge and practices in nutrition have been low. However, Knowledge was a predictor of good practices in these communes. It is necessary to improve caregiver nutrition knowledge if we want to improve child feeding practices in Huila, Angola.