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Topical Area: Global Nutrition

Global Nutrition (Poster Session)

(P17-013-23) Age-Specific Factors Associated With Malaria Between Children of Age 6–23.9 Months and 24–59 Months in Nigeria

Sunday, July 23, 2023

12:45 PM – 1:45 PM ET

Location: Poster Board 311

Presenting Author(s)

WC

Woojae Choi, MPH

Graduate
Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Baltimore, Maryland, United States

Co-Author(s)

YK

Yunhee Kang, PhD

Associate Scientist
Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health
Baltimore, Maryland, United States

Disclosure(s):

Woojae Choi, MPH: No relevant financial relationship(s) with ineligible companies to disclose.

Objectives: Reducing malaria prevalence among children continues to be a public health challenge in Nigeria. Child age is important to analyze as socioeconomic and physiologic factors affecting malaria exposure are markedly different between younger and older children. This study aims to examine age-common and age-specific factors associated with malaria between younger children (age 6-23.9 months) and older children (age 24-59 months) in Nigeria.

Methods: The study used data of younger children (n=2914) and older children (n=5533) from the 2018 Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey (DHS). Children with malaria were identified as those who tested positive in either microscopy or rapid diagnostic testing at the time of survey. A total of 68 socio-economic, household, nutritional, and geographical variables were analyzed for association with malaria using univariate and multivariate logistic regression.

Results: The proportion of children with malaria was 37.3% among younger children and 49.4% among older children. Age-common factors that showed significant associations with malaria in both groups were anemia of the child, anemia of the mother, living in households owning agricultural land, living in the South West region (Reference: North Central region), and rural residency (All 95% CIs were > 1). Age-specific factors for younger children included internet use by the mother (OR=0.46, 95% CI: 0.27-0.79), father working in sectors of agriculture or manual labor (OR=1.31, 95% CI: 1.02-1.69), living in the South East region (OR=2.04, 95% CI: 1.24-3.36) and current breastfeeding (OR=0.69, 95% CI: 0.53-0.90). Comparably, for older children, household use of insecticide-treated nets (OR=1.51, 95% CI: 1.07-2.14), living in the North East (OR=0.37, 95% CI: 0.24-0.58), inclusion in the poorest wealth quintile (OR=3.36, 95% CI: 1.35-8.36, reference: inclusion in the wealthiest wealth quintile), mother without formal education (OR=4.14, 95% CI: 1.99-8.60, reference: higher education) showed significant associations with malaria.

Conclusions: Various behavioral, socioeconomic, and physiologic mechanisms may explain the results of the age-common and age-specific malaria risk factors. Further investigations are warranted to identify the underlying mechanisms and develop appropriate responses in Nigeria.

Funding Sources: N/A