injuries and illness: Global Health

Physical Development in Early Childhood

• Children typically grow around 5-6 centimeters per year during early childhood.
• A child at the 20th percentile for weight has a weight lower than 80% of other children of the same age and sex.

Height and Weight Percentiles

• The average height of a 3-year-old boy at the 50th percentile is around 95-100 centimeters.
• The average weight of a 5-year-old girl at the 50th percentile is around 18-20 kilograms.

Growth Patterns in Early Childhood

• Children tend to gain more in height than in weight during early childhood.
• Bodily proportions change during early childhood, with the head and torso growing more slowly than the legs and arms.

International Comparisons of Height and Weight

• Average heights and weights are generally higher in developed countries than in developing countries.
• A 6-year-old in Bangladesh would be shorter on average than a 4-year-old in Sweden.

Mortality Rates in Early Childhood

• The most common cause of death in developed countries during early childhood is unintentional injury.
• The leading cause of death in developing countries during early childhood is infectious disease.

Socioeconomic Status and Growth

• In developing countries, socioeconomic status is strongly associated with childhood height and weight gains.

Biological Factors in Growth

• The primary reason for individual differences in height and weight gains during childhood, given equal levels of nutrition and health care, is genetic variation.

Child Maltreatment

• Child maltreatment can take many forms, including physical abuse, emotional abuse, neglect, and sexual abuse.
• Neglect is the most common primary type of substantiated abuse in Australia.

Child Maltreatment in Australia

• Around 3% of children in Australia received child protection services in 2016-17.
• Children from areas of lowest socioeconomic status are over-represented in child maltreatment cases.
• The most common primary types of substantiated abuse and neglect in Australia are neglect and emotional abuse.
• Around 15% of children in child maltreatment cases in Australia were from areas of the lowest socioeconomic status.
• Around 10% of children were the subject of multiple substantiations in 2014-15 in Australia.