Healthcare in North Korea - Famine and Poverty

Famine and Poverty

There are issues in North Korea regarding quality of living which impact negatively on its citizen’s health. For example, only 60% of the population had access to improved sanitation facilities in 2000. During the 1990s, the country was ravaged by famine, causing the death of between 500,000 and 3 million people. Food shortages are ongoing today, with factors such as bad weather, lack of fertilizer and a drop in international donation meaning that North Koreans do not have enough to eat. A study of North Koreans in 2008 found that three-quarters of respondents had reduced their food intake. Extreme poverty is also a factor in the hunger faced by North Korean people, with 27% of the population living at or below the absolute poverty line of less than US $1 a day.

These food shortages cause a number of malnutrition diseases. For example, a 2009 UNICEF report found that North Korea was “one of 18 countries with the highest prevalence of stunting (moderate and severe) among children under 5 years old”. North Korea is also experiencing a tuberculosis epidemic, with 5% of the population infected with the disease; this has been attributed to the “overall deterioration in health and nutrition status of the population as well as the rundown of the public health services”.