Abstract
A deteriorating North Korean economy, coupled with a devastating natural disaster such as flooding and drought in recent years, brought about a severe food shortage and malnutrition problem which caused a migration of its population including young children to neighboring countries. We conducted a nutritional survey on a total of 436 children, aged 4-19 years old, who migrated to the China side of the border from July to September, 1999. The study subjects were interviewed by Korean-Chinese interviewers who were trained for anthropometric measurements and dietary surveys. Heights, weights, and chest circumference of the subjects were 70-90% of the South Korean reference values for the corresponding age and sex. Dietary intakes of the subjects were found to be extremely poor-the average number of food, mostly of plant origin, consumed in a day was 2.8, and the proportion of the subject who reported to take all three meals in a day while residing in North Korea was as low as 36.2%. Ninety five percent of the subjects had at least one clinical symptom related to malnutrition, 68.6% had 2-4 symptoms, and 15.1% had 5 or more symptoms. The results of this study provided an objective data for the first time on the severity of the food crisis and malnutrition problem that afflicted North Korean older children and adolescents as well as children aged 7 or under as previously reported elsewhere. the wasted and stunted children and youths prevailing in North Korea could exert a negative influence on the country's health and economy. More researches are needed in the future to investigate on the impact of malnutrition in North Korean children on the country's social, economic, and cultural state as well as on the health and nutrition situation.
