Socio-Economic Determinants of Diarrhea Occurrence Among Children Under Five Years Old in Kenyan Slums: A Case Study of Korogocho, In Nairobi County, Kenya
- Country : Kenya
- Subject : Geography
Keywords : Diarrhoea occurrence, Child care takers, Demographic factors, Socio-economic factors, Chi-square ( )
Abstract
According to the recent world estimates, children below the age of five years are in most cases at a very high risk of contracting diarrhea infections. The socio-economic characteristics of the caregivers and the households influences the kind of environment in which these children grow. The age of 5 years and below is characterized by socio economic aspects and environment of weaning, psychomotor skills of crawling and walking as well as picking and touching materials and surfaces that may be contaminated with diarrhea pathogens. This study was carried out to assess the socio-economic factors that are associated with diarrhea occurrence among children below five years in Korogocho slum located in Nairobi, Kenya. The study area was purposively sampled while the 90 respondents (mothers of children below five years) were randomly sampled from the entire slum composed of 12,909 households. Data on diarrhoea outcome and its determinants was based on two weeks recall and self-reporting survey while the socio-economic variables included size of household, marital status, levels of education and levels of income. Based on two weeks recall, 35.6% of the child mothers reported that their children had suffered diarrhoea related illness two weeks prior to the study against 64.4% who reported non-occurrence. The study established the dominant age brackets of respondents (49%) were between 29-38 years of age. In regard to marital status, out of the 90 respondents, 72 of them were married (80%) while 18 were not married (20%). In regard to the size of household and the occurrence of childhood diarrhea, majority of the respondents came from households that had 3-4 members (81.1%). In regard to the education level of mothers, majority of mothers reported to have undergone secondary school and above (72.2%). The Chi square analysis for this variable { = 16.728}, revealed that there was significant relationship between levels of education of the mother and the occurrence of diarrhoea of children below five years. The main source of income for the respondents was salaried, casual employment and small-scale businesses. 69% of respondents reported that the household in which they came from earned less than Ksh 5,000 per month while the rest 31% reported to have an income of more than Ksh 5,000 per month. The study recommends that the Government and other stake holders should ensure that the residents of informal settlements have adequate access to quality and affordable education and reliable sources of livelihoods
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