What Is Hunger???

Hunger is a world wide problem that effects 854 million people across the world and is directly related to constrained financial resources. This is a complex issue, and addressing it appropriately needs to be informed by an understanding of why it exists in the first place, free of commonly held misperceptions and myths.

This is particularly devastating to children, increasing their susceptibility to: chronic illness, behavioral problems, physical, mental and emotional, delays lowered attention spans, absenteeism, tardiness and school suspensions.

It is also the most commonly used term to describe the social condition of people who frequently experience, or live with the threat of experiencing, the physical sensation of hunger and is a problem all over the world.

Hunger for me is, firstly, empty stomach.

It alter one's attention span and impair one's intellectual abilities, can weaken one's immune system, and can cause death.

The effects are even worse on children than on adults, it slows thinking, saps energy, hinders fetal development and contributes to mental retardation, thus trapping individuals and households in a vicious cycle of ill health and diminished capacity for learning and work, causing and contributing to widespread poverty and death, it entails large economic costs, severely compromising the productivity of individuals, the growth of nations and the sustainable use of natural resources

It kills the soul before it kills the body and leaves its imprint on children for years and frequently prevents them from reaching their highest potential.

. Employers and teachers may see hungry people as slow or lazy, when in fact they suffer from lethargy, the body's response to prolonged calorie and nutrient deprivation.

Programs must use approaches that address not only the basic needs of hungry people, but also focus on the underlying social, economic, environmental, and political causes of hunger.

Yearly, we spend billions on our "defense" while many children in our own country and in nations around the world go to bed hungry at night. Now it says there are 799 million hungry people in the developing countries. Does this mean that the number of hungry has increased

. All regions have some people who are hungry.In the second half of the 1990s, however, the number of chronically hungry in developing countries started to increase at a rate of almost four million per year, with this insight, our responsibility to the hungry becomes clear.

There are hungry people and well-fed people in virtually every country and virtually every community.

Thus, being hungry means anguish,the anguish of making impossible choices

But for more than 850 million people, the hunger never ends, every day, millions of people around the world eat only the bare minimum of food to keep themselves alive.

For example, between 100 and 140 million children suffer from vitamin A deficiency and as a result, more than 2 million children each year suffer severe problems with their eyesight.

On average, 62 million people die each year, of whom probably 36 million (58 per cent) directly or indirectly as a result of nutritional deficiencies, infections, epidemics or diseases which attack the body when its resistance and immunity have been weakened by undernourishment and hunger

More than two million children die every year from dehydration caused by diarrhea. At least 5 million children around the world die of hunger each year, and more than 850 million people around the world are going to bed hungry, according to the United Nations.

Today, one in nearly seven people does not get enough food to be healthy and lead an active life, making hunger and malnutrition the number one risk to health worldwide -- greater than AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis combined.

Most often, many families simply don't have enough money left after paying rent, utilities and health care to purchase enough food.

Every human being must eat to continue living, and must eat well so as to be healthy.

Children especially need adequate nutrition to develop properly or risk serious health problems, including impaired cognitive development; growth failure; physical weakness; anemia, and stunting.

Food gives us the energy and nutrients we need to grow and develop; to move, work, play, think and learn; and to maintail life and health.

Many low-income people simply do not have enough income to cover their most basic needs: food, shelter, clothing, healthcare, transportation and childcare, The health symptoms may not be immediately visible to either the individuals themselves or to health workers, or they can take years to manifest themselves. Hungry people are unable to work to their full potential, are more susceptible to ill health and lack the capacity to save and invest.

Hunger also seriously affects adults, impeding their productivity and creating a host of associated health problems, making their lives even more difficult. Ignoring the signs of hunger is not a natural or desired state of being for healthy people also the lack of health facilities and the dreadful state of public services and the exploitation that goes on in the name of private healthcare leaves much to be desired.

When a family can’t grow enough food or earn enough money for food, there is no available assistance. When a family can not afford these healthy foods, they are often replaced with less expensive “filler” food with empty calories.

Countries all over the world are striken with poverty, and many people, children and adults,go without food for far too long.

Many developing countries are also poor and have no social safety nets.

One problem is that some of the world's poorest countries owe hundreds of billions of dollars in debt to many of the more developed countries and are calling for the developed countries to cancel their debt, which would mean that the less developed country would not have to repay it. Because of all of this money flowing out of these less developed countries, there is very little left to establish an economic infrastructure.

Chronic hunger -- or food insecurity -- is as devastating to families, communities, and countries as is famine. For example, many older people in all countries have serious protein and micronutrient deficiencies.

Some of the countries that have been most successful in significantly reducing hunger -- such as South Korea and Taiwan -- have been those that paid great attention to education, health care and land reform.

The United States can also help by not forcing down the throats of developing countries policies that benefit multinational corporations instead of people.

This is  becoming an issue we can't stop and is often a related effect of poverty. It is not getting enough of the right kinds of foods to meet our needs and is most devastating when it attacks children, since it can affect their mental and physical development for the rest of their lives, thus deepening the poverty cycle since they have less access to education and opportunities for work later in life.

Acute hunger or starvation are often highlighted on TV screens: hungry mothers too weak to breastfeed their children in drought-hit Ethiopia, refugees in war-torn Darfur queueing for food rations, helicopters airlifting high energy biscuits to earthquake victims in Pakistan or Indonesia.

A hungry mind cannot concentrate, a hungry body does not take initiative, a hungry child loses all desire to play and study. Deprived of the right nutrition, hungry children are especially vulnerable and become too weak to fight off disease and may die from common infections like measles and diarrhoea.

Truly, then hunger is the ultimate symbol of powerlessness.