[The social determinants of child malnutrition in Colombia from a family medicine perspective].

CONTEXT: Child malnutrition is a public health problem not only in Colombia but throughout the world, as it increases mortality associated with preventable causes. In Colombia, poverty is one of those causes present mainly in rural areas where one in 10 children suffers from malnutrition.

METHODOLOGY: We searched ScienceDirect, PubMed, ClinicalKey, and SciELO for references on child malnutrition, its social determinants, and elements for its intervention in Colombia.

RESULTS

The review allowed us to identify that many factors influence this problem determined not only by the lack of food but also by other factors such as poverty, lack of resources, restricted access to health care, rising prices of essential foods, political conflicts leading forced displacement, drought, the absence of an equity-based policy approach, poor environmental sanitation, among others.

CONCLUSIONS

Child malnutrition should not be conceived as mainly a food-related problem. Other factors that influence this problem should also be taken into account in order to prevent it. Trained personnel should be deployed to intervene in the social determinants that underpin child malnutrition. Thus, in Colombia, the family physician is a fundamental link in the health system, responsible for providing comprehensive medical care and for the leadership of the newly introduced health model based on primary health care.