United States: Prevalence of wasting, weight for height, female (% of children under 5)

Key figures

Since 1991 it is down 0.4 percentage points from 0.4% in 1991. The World Bank has no value for 17 of the years in between; the chart leaves those gaps open rather than joining across them.

Closest to United States in the 2018 ranking

• Jamaica — 1st of 2: 3.1%

What this measures

Prevalence of wasting, female, is the proportion of girls under age 5 whose weight for height is more than two standard deviations below the median for the international reference population ages 0-59 months.

Limitations: Survey estimates come with levels of uncertainty due to both sampling error and non-sampling error (e.g., measurement technical error, recording error etc.,). None of the two sources of errors have been fully taken into account for deriving estimates neither at country nor at regional or worldwide levels. Surveys are carried out in a specific period of the year, usually over a few months. However, this indicator can be affected by seasonality, factors related to food availability (e.g., pre-harvest periods), disease (e.g.,rainy season and diarrhoea, malaria, etc.), and natural disasters and conflicts. Hence, country-year estimates may not necessarily be comparable over time.

All 11 values

More health data for United States

• Population ages 00-04, female (% of female population) — 5.25% (2025)
• Population ages 00-04, male (% of male population) — 5.45% (2025)
• Population ages 0-14, female — 28.47 million (2025)
• Population ages 0-14, female (% of female population) — 16.74% (2025)
• Population ages 0-14, male — 29.97 million (2025)
• Population ages 0-14, male (% of male population) — 17.45% (2025)
• Population ages 0-14, total — 58.44 million (2025)
• Population ages 0-14 (% of total population) — 17.1% (2025)
• Population ages 05-09, female (% of female population) — 5.57% (2025)

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Questions people ask

What is United States's prevalence of wasting, weight for height, female (% of children under 5)?

0% in 2018, according to the World Bank (World Development Indicators).

How has it changed since 1991?

It is down 0.4 percentage points from 0.4% in 1991. The highest value was 1.1% in 2006 and the lowest 0% in 2010.

Where does this data come from?

The World Bank's World Development Indicators, licensed CC BY 4.0. Original source: UNICEF, WHO, World Bank: Joint child Malnutrition Estimates (JME). Aggregation is based on UNICEF, WHO, and the World Bank harmonized dataset (adjusted, comparable data) and methodology., UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), note: Aggregation is based on UNICEF, WHO, and the World Bank harmonized dataset (a….

Source

World Bank, World Development Indicators, indicator SH.STA.WAST.FE.ZS, licensed CC BY 4.0. Original source: UNICEF, WHO, World Bank: Joint child Malnutrition Estimates (JME). Aggregation is based on UNICEF, WHO, and the World Bank harmonized dataset (adjusted, comparable data) and methodology., UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), note: Aggregation is based on UNICEF, WHO, and the World Bank harmonized dataset (a… Figures are fetched from the World Bank API and refreshed monthly; see the series on data.worldbank.org. The full definition and method are in the World Bank's metadata glossary. Comparisons use the same World Bank release.

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