2. More than a quarter of children in developing countries are underweight and suffer disease because of their poor diet and… …in some areas almost half of all under-fives are malnourished.
5. In some cases, malnutrition is very mild and causes no symptoms. However, sometimes it can be so severe that the damage done to the body is permanent, even though you survive.
6. Malnutrition, in the form of iodine deficiency, is "the most common preventable cause of mental impairment worldwide." Even moderate iodine deficiency, especially in pregnant women and infants, lowers intelligence by 10 to 15 I.Q. points, shaving incalculable potential off a nation’s development. The most visible and severe effects — disabling goiters, cretinism and dwarfism — affect a tiny minority, usually in mountain villages. But 16 percent of the world’s people have at least mild goiter, a swollen thyroid gland in the neck.