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Poorer children hit hardest as scurvy makes a comeback in France (www.rfi.fr)

submitted 5 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Hospital doctors and researchers from France's public health research body (Inserm) and Université Paris Cité analysed trends among nearly 900 children hospitalised with scurvy in France over a nine-year period, until November 2023.

The study, published in the medical journal The Lancet, found the biggest increase in cases was among children aged four to 10, and largely those from low-income families.

"There would seem to be a link with poverty," said Ulrich Meinzer, the study’s coordinator and a paediatrician at Robert-Debré Hospital in Paris.

He underlined that 32.9 percent of the hospitalised children came from families receiving universal medical cover – an indicator of very low income.

"Nurses noted that some of the infected children had not eaten for several days," Meinzer told French news magazine Le Nouvel Obs.

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[–] [email protected] 36 points 5 days ago (1 children)

How can you refer to your country as a First World Nation if parts of your population still suffers from scurvy ... or the near conditions of scurvy?

I'm in Canada and I'm Indigenous Canadian and I laugh every time someone refers to this country as First World .... I have family who live in remote northern Indigenous communities with boil water advisories, no indoor running water, moldy houses and people living with families of 20 or more people in a two bedroom house.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 4 days ago

Actually, what you describe is pretty typical for rural living in most first world nations.

Ruling classes don't care about peasants out in the country because it's easier to make more money off of city dwellers.