Background: In the Philippines, the prevalence of food insecurity increased during the COVID-19 pandemic, affecting the nutritional status of communities nationwide. Urban areas in particular are vulnerable to the harmful effects of food insecurity, and the effects are extended and magnified when it comes to children. Objectives: This study aims to evaluate the coping strategies of households with children aged 0-10 years old in an urban poor community in Quezon City. In particular, the study will determine Coping Strategies Index (CSI) scores and the frequency of specific coping strategies used. Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study was conducted to assess the coping strategies of 405 households with children in the community during the pandemic. Mothers or caregivers were given a survey inquiring about the sociodemographic data and CSI. Results: Sociodemographic profiling showed that the households generally belonged to class D and E (PhP 15,000 and below) income households (73.8%). The majority of the household heads (52.6%) have their highest educational attainment at the high school level. The majority (77.5%) of the households were categorized as having low CSI classification (90%CI: 73.9, 80.8). This could indicate that relief operations conducted in the community may have helped ease their food insecurity. Coping strategies that were most frequently employed by the households were depending on less preferred or more affordable food (74.8%), rationing money for prepared food (69.1%), and purchasing food on credit (58.5%). Conclusion Low CSI classification was noted, which may be due to increased adaptation to persistent food insecurity and the utilization of coping strategies not indicated in the questionnaire. Common coping strategies used by households include reliance on less favored or less costly food items, rationing resources for prepared food, and food on credit. It is recommended that the results collected be used to target food availability and accessibility interventions in the community.
Food Insecurity ; Adaptation, Psychological

Objective: Rural and urban differences affect food availability, accessibility, and sustainability; thus, it has a great impact on household food security and dietary diversity. The relationship between the human environment and other factors threatens different domains of food systems resulting in food security. The objective of this study is to determine significant differences between the prevalence of household food security and diet diversity between urban and rural communities in Occidental Mindoro. Specifically, to determine the pattern of usual food intake of preschool children between rural and urban communities Methods: This study utilized a comparative, cross-sectional, analytic study design in order to determine the prevalence of each variable of interest in the two study areas. Radimer-Cornell Tool was utilized to assess the food security status of the household while the FAO-Dietary Diversity Score Questionnaire was used to the diversity of diet among PSC. A total of 480 (rural: n=240; urban: n=240) preschool children were recruited to participate in this study. Ratio and proportion using the point and interval estimate were used to determine the prevalence in different areas, meanwhile, chi-square of homogeneity was used to determine significant difference in the two areas under study. Results: Food insecurity in rural communities was found to be at 56.25% (95% CI: 49.97% to 62.53%) while the prevalence in urban communities was 45.83% (95% CI: 39.53% to 52.14%). There was a significant difference in the prevalence of household food insecurity between rural and urban communities (p=0.0224). Meanwhile, the prevalence of less dietary diversity among preschool children in rural communities was 37.08% (95%: 30.97% to 43.19%) and 26.25% (CI: 20.68% to 31.82%) for urban communities. There was a significant difference in prevalence of low dietary diversity score among preschool children between rural and urban communities (p=0.0107). Conclusion There were significant differences in terms of household food insecurity and less diverse diet between two community settings. Higher prevalence in rural areas signifies that there is a need to prioritize these vulnerable communities in terms of hunger mitigation and nutrition programs. A combination of milk-rice-meat-fish was observed in the diet of preschool children for both communities however, higher prevalence of less dietary diversity was detected among rural communities.
Child ; Preschool ; Food Insecurity Diet

Food insecurity affects food intake, and it could prevent an individual from consuming enough nutritious food to support and maintain health. The aim of this paper is to determine the prevalence and factors influencing food insecurity among Malaysian households. In 2014, the Malaysian Adult Nutrition Survey (MANS) was carried out, and one of the components measured was food insecurity. Six out of sixteen questions from the food security core-module questionnaire were adopted and answered by 2962 adults. The results showed that about 25.0% adult experienced food quantity insufficiency, 25.5% had food variety insufficiency, 21.9% practised reduced size of the meal, and 15.2% skipped main meal due to lack of money to spend on. For the parents, 23.7% only rely on cheap food to feed children, and 20.8% could not afford to purchase various foods to feed their children. Location, strata, race, level of education, working status and household income shows significant difference while none of the nutritional status components found to be difference in all six parameters of food insecurity measured. Logistic regression with adjusted odds ratios discovered race, education level and household income were related to risk to all six parameters of food insecurity. In conclusion, food insecurity can be a serious problem in Malaysia. An effective and comprehensive effort by the government in terms of policy solution is required to increase education level and ensure an adequate income for every household. Therefore, future research should focus on some of those promising policy solutions and at the same time, study the other possible underlying factors that may lead to food insecurity.
Food Insecurity ; Malaysia ; Adult ; Nutrition Survey

Background: The low detection rate of tuberculosis (TB) cases in Malaysia remains a challenge in the effort to end TB by 2030. The collaboration between private and public health care facilities is essential in addressing this issue. As of now, no private-public health care collaborative program in pulmonary tuberculosis (PTB) screening exists in Malaysia. Aim: To determine the feasibility of a collaborative program between private general practitioners (GPs) and the public primary health clinics in PTB screening and to assess the yield of smearpositive PTB from this program. Methods: A prospective cohort study using convenient sampling was conducted involving GPs and public health clinics in the North-East District, Penang, from March 2018 to May 2019. In this study, GPs could direct all suspected PTB patients to perform a sputum acid fast bacilli (AFB) direct smear in any of the dedicated public primary health clinics. The satisfaction level of both the GPs and their patients were assessed using a self-administered client satisfaction questionnaire. IBM SPSS Statistical Software was used to analyze the data. Results: Out of a total of 31 patients who underwent the sputum investigation for PTB, one (3.2%) was diagnosed to have smear-positive PTB. Most of the patients (>90%) and GPs (66.7%) agreed to continue with this program in the future. Furthermore, most of the patients (>90%) were satisfied with the program structure. Conclusion: It is potentially feasible to involve GPs in combating TB. However, a more structured program addressing the identified issues is needed to make the collaborative program a success.
Food Insecurity ; Malaysia ; Adult ; Nutrition Survey

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Food security is a multifaceted issue experienced by nations worldwide. A trend currently being explored in recent studies in measuring food security at the micro level is the Dietary Diversity Score (DDS). Household Dietary Diversity Score (HDDS), a type of DDS, obtains a snapshot of the economic ability of a household, making it an effective food insecurity indicator. The objective of this study was to assess the validity of the HDDS as a tool for measuring food insecurity.

METHODOLOGY: The study employed a cross-sectional analytic design with 368 study households in Lucena City, Quezon Philippines. Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS) and Household Mean Adequacy Ratio (HHMAR), being two of the most frequently used methods in measuring household food insecurity, were used as reference standards to assess the validity of the HDDS in identifying food insecure households. Receiver Operating Curve (ROC) Analysis was done to determine the appropriate HDDS cut-off for identifying food insecure households.

RESULTS: The areas under the curve (AUC) obtained (0.618, 0.70, 0.701, 0.743), classified HDDS as a "fair indicator" of food insecurity. HDDS of 6 was identified as the optimal score when evaluating food insecurity withconsideration of sensitivity and specificity.

CONCLUSION: In this study, HDDS was proven to be a valid measure of food insecurity. It shows the great potential of this quick assessment tool in identifying population-at-risk, which is crucial in the design of a timely and appropriate intervention to alleviate food insecurity and other nutrition and health-related problems whichmay arise.

Consumer Product Safety ; legislation & jurisprudence ; Food Supply ; legislation & jurisprudence

To understand the extent of food insecurity in Bangladesh emphasizing on the non cereal food availability and maternal and child nutritional outcome. We conducted systematic review in between 1985 to 2010 by using PubMed and Google Scholar databases as well as archives of relevant journals by hand. Contacting with the author was also performed in the case where original data needed. Results from the evidence it may be sated that despite the growth of cereal production and its availability Bangladesh is still problems with accessing of non cereal foods (e.g., vegetable, fruits, fish, milk, meat, egg etc) as well as the incidence of acute malnutrition in children and mothers were hardnosed in the rural area of Bangladesh.
Food Supply ; Body Mass Index ; Malnutrition ; Child ; Mothers ; Bangladesh

Objective: Based on data related to arsenic contents in paddy rice, as part of the food safety monitoring programs in 2017, to discuss and explore the application of spatial analysis used for food safety risk assessment. Methods: One province was chosen to study the spatial visualization, spatial point model estimation, and kernel density estimation. Moran's I statistic of spatial autocorrelation methods was used to analyze the spatial distribution at the county level. Results: Data concerning the spatial point model estimation showed that the spatial distribution of pollution appeared relatively dispersive. From the kernel density estimation, we found that the hot spots of pollution were mainly located in the central and eastern regions. The global Moran's I values appeared as 0.11 which presented low spatial aggregation to the rice arsenic contamination and with statistically significant differences. One "high-high" and two typical "low-low" clustering were seen in this study. Conclusion: Results from our study provided good visual demonstration, identification of pollution distribution rules, hot spots and aggregation areas for research on the distribution of food pollutants. Spatial statistics can provide technical support for the implementation of issue-based monitoring programs.
Arsenic/adverse effects* ; China ; Cluster Analysis ; Food Contamination ; Food Supply ; Humans ; Spatial Analysis

This study examined the hygiene practices of contract foodservice employees and investigated the influence of education and work environment on these hygienes practices. A questionnaire was distributed to 250 contract foodservice employees and a total of 232 responses were received and analyzed. The overall score for hygiene practices of contract foodservice employees was 3.89 based on a 5-point scale. Cross-contamination was prominent (highest score at 4.46) and the heating temperature was less prominent (lowest score at 3.49). The factors most affecting contract foodservice employees were their work period, the size of the contract foodservice management company, the number of meals served daily, the frequency of meal service per day and the frequency of hygiene education. Compared to small and medium-sized contract foodservice management companies, the major contract foodservice management companies showed higher scores for refrigerator/freezer control (P<0.001), vegetable/fruit disinfection (P<0.001), thawing (P<0.001), heating temperature (P<0.001), cleaning/disinfection (P<0.01), and personal hygiene (P<0.05). The frequency of hygiene education had a significant effect on the performance levels for refrigerator/freezer control (P<0.001), vegetable/fruit disinfection (P<0.001), thawing (P<0.001), heating temperature (P<0.001), cleaning/disinfection control (P<0.001), food supply control (P<0.05), and personal hygiene (P<0.05). From these results, to increase the sanitation quality of contract foodservice operations, hygiene practice levels need to increase and hygiene education systematically should be enforced for foodservice employees.
Contracts ; Disinfection ; Food Supply ; Heating ; Hot Temperature ; Humans ; Hygiene ; Meals ; Surveys and Questionnaires ; Sanitation

BACKGROUND: This study was conducted to analyze the influence of socioeconomic characteristics of community on the food insecurity under the control of personal socioeconomic factors which may be influence to the food security. METHODS: Food insecurity and individual socioeconomic characteristics were obtained from 2012 community health survey. Socioeconomic characteristics of communities were extracted from the data of Statistics Korea and local governments. Personal socioeconomic factors were sex, age, educational status, job, and monthly family income. Socioeconomic characteristics of communities were administrative district (urban vs. rural), senior population rate, degree of financial self reliance, degree of financial independence, portion of welfare budget, number of welfare facilities, and unemployment rate. We analysed the relationships between the food insecurity and socioeconomic characteristics of community using multi-level analysis under the control of personal characteristics. RESULTS: On personal level age, sex, education status, and monthly family income were related with food insecurity. On community level administrative district (urban vs. rural), degree of financial independence, unemployment rate, and proportion of welfare budget among local general government accounts were related to individual food insecurity. Rural area, district with low levels of financial independence, low portion of welfare budget, and greater unemployment rate showed a higher level of food insecurity. CONCLUSION: To reduce the level of food insecurity in a community it is necessary to decrease the unemployment rate, in addition to providing support from the central government by increasing the proportion of the welfare budget so that both factors contribute to raising the degree of financial independence.
Adult* ; Budgets ; Education ; Educational Status ; Food Supply* ; Health Surveys ; Humans ; Korea ; Socioeconomic Factors ; Unemployment