International journal of epidemiology
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Prolonged breastfeeding in developing countries is routinely recommended as a valuable and cost-effective public health measure to promote early childhood growth. However, the effects of breastfeeding beyond 12 months are unclear, with some studies showing positive, and some showing negative effects. The role of complementary foods for children 1-3 years has been less studied. ⋯ Public health efforts which focus only on prolonged breastfeeding (>12 months) in developing countries will not ensure adequate early childhood growth. Important complementary feeding recommendations that promote diet diversity, through the inclusion of a variety of foods in the diets of children in the 1-3 year age group, are needed.
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Comparative Study
Firearm-related deaths in the United States and 35 other high- and upper-middle-income countries.
The Forty-Ninth World Health Assembly recently declared violence a worldwide public health problem. Improved understanding of cross-national differences is useful for identifying risk factors and may facilitate prevention efforts. Few cross-national studies, however, have explored firearm-related deaths. We compared the incidence of firearm-related deaths among 36 countries. ⋯ Firearm death rates vary markedly throughout the industrialized world. Further research to identify risk factors associated with these variations may help improve prevention efforts.
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Evidence on respiratory symptoms due to smoking and passive smoking in children is mainly derived from studies in Western countries. Evidence from the East was required to support stronger tobacco control policy in Asia. This study aimed to analyse the relationship between respiratory symptoms and smoking status in junior secondary students and between respiratory symptoms and family smoking in never-smoking students. ⋯ This study provides strong evidence that both active and passive smoking can cause respiratory ill health in Chinese children in Hong Kong. Urgent measures are needed to protect children from the health hazards of active and passive smoking in Asia.
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The purpose of this study was to analyse misclassification of height, weight and body mass index (BMI), derived from mail questionnaires, and its dependency on socioeconomic factors. ⋯ Our study shows that socioeconomic differences in height, when using self-reported information, involve an underestimation. This means that the height differences between socioeconomic groups in Sweden may actually be higher than that reported by individuals in surveys. The socioeconomic differences in underweight tend to be underestimated for men, as well as obesity for women, when using self-reported information. The socioeconomic differences in overweight and obesity are shown to be overestimated for men.
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Reports on serum uric acid (SUA) levels in Chinese populations are sparse, but there is evidence that hyperuricaemia and gout are not uncommon. This paper characterizes SUA levels, their correlates, and their relationship to blood pressure (BP) and prevalent high blood pressure (HBP) for urban and rural adult population samples in north China. ⋯ In addition to its strong association with body mass index, SUA is independently related to serum lipids, particularly triglycerides, and to serum glucose. While some of the univariate relation of SUA to BP is apparently due to the strong relation of body mass to both SUA and BP, a low order significant relation between SUA and BP remains with control for BMI.