The role of zinc supplementation for diarrhoea in children: a critical review

Background: Nearly 1.7 million children suffer from diarrhoea and around 760,000 die each year. The high prevalence of diarrhoea in the developing countries is closely related to lack of safe drinking water, inadequate sanitation and hygiene, and poor health and nutritional status. These environmental conditions facilitate the spread of infectious disease easily. The great morbidity and mortality of this preventable and treatable disease raise concern on how to save children from this fatal disease by improving management of diarrhoea. Several studies suggest that zinc deficiency contribute towards high morbidity and mortality in diarrhoea. Further, there is an area of uncertainty regarding how significant zinc supplementation will help to reduce the duration and severity of diarrhoea in children compared to the diarrhoea management without zinc