Stunting is still a priority health problem for the Indonesian Government with a national prevalence target of 14% by 2024. However, the prevalence of stunting in Lebak Regency, Banten Province, is still high, namely 26.2% according to the 2022 SSGI. This figure is still much higher than the national average of around 21%.
Various efforts to overcome stunting have been carried out, especially for pregnant women and toddlers, such as providing additional food to pregnant women with Chronic Energy Deficiency (KEK) or thin and malnourished toddlers, to providing exclusive breastfeeding. Providing Blood Supplement Tablets (TTD) has also been a national program in the past 50 years ago, however the prevalence of anemia in pregnant women is still high, reaching 48.9% according to 2018 Riskesdas data.
This shows that the prevention and control of stunting in pregnant women, although it can have an impact, is considered too late. This is because improving nutrition in pregnant women, which is expected to have an impact on the fetus and child, will take quite a long time. Therefore, efforts to reduce the increase in new stunting cases in the future must be carried out further upstream.
It is known that 1 in 4 Indonesian teenage girls suffer from anemia (low red blood cells and/or hemoglobin in the blood). Without proper treatment, these anemic teenage girls will become pregnant women who are also anemic and increase the prevalence of stunting in the future. The high rate of early marriage also makes this problem worse, as proven in a study by Fauziah (2018), one of the villages in Lebak Regency had an increase in cases of self-marriage from 42.10% in 2015 to 45.45% in 2016 and increased again in 2015. 2017 to reach 55.17%.
Paying attention to this, Nurul Dina Rahmawati, S.Gz., M.Sc., as a lecturer at the Department of Nutrition, Faculty of Public Health Universitas Indonesia, chaired a Community Service program with the theme “Healthy Teenagers (Teen Room): Innovation Efforts to Improve Health, Nutrition and Youth Productivity” which was implemented at SMKN 1 Kalanganyar. In collaboration with Kalanganyar District, Bayu Hadiyana T., S.IP., M.Sc., Head of Kalanganyar District, on October 2, 2023, conveyed ideas related to handling stunting in Kalanganyar District, through the Educational House for Stunting Handling. This Education House will later become a center for control, monitoring, and evaluation of activities in the context of handling stunting in Kalanganyar District so that all activities are well coordinated with all parties across sectors.
“Stunting is not only a matter of height, but also has a bad impact on brain development and intelligence,” said Bayu. This was emphasized again by Nurul Dina, “Stunting has a cross-generational impact: with low adolescent achievement, productivity in adulthood will also be hampered and increase the risk of having stunted children born again in the future.” Therefore, as prospective mothers for the next generation, young women need to pay attention to their health, to avoid anemia, as well as avoid early marriage which will increase the physical and emotional burden for teenagers.