Hunger pangs

In politics, humanitarian aid, and social science, hunger is a condition in which a person, for a sustained period, is unable to eat sufficient food to meet basic nutritional needs. So in the field of hunger relief, the term hunger is used in a sense that goes beyond the common desire for food that all humans experience. Throughout history, portions of the world's population have often suffered sustained periods of hunger. In many cases, this resulted from food supply disruptions caused by war, plagues, or adverse weather. In the decades following World War II, technological progress and enhanced political cooperation suggested it might be possible to substantially reduce the number of people suffering from hunger. While progress was uneven, by 2015 the threat of extreme hunger subsided for many of the world's people. According to figures published by the FAO in 2019 however, the number of people suffering from chronic hunger has been increasing over the last four years. This is both as a percentage of the world's population, and in absolute terms, with about 821 million afflicted with hunger in 2018. While most of the world's hungry people continue to live in Asia, much of the increase in hunger since 2015 occurred in Africa and South America. The FAO's 2017 report discussed three principal reasons for the recent increase in hunger: climate, conflict, and economic slowdowns. The 2018 report focused on extreme weather as a primary driver of the increase in hunger, finding rises were especially severe in countries where the agricultural systems were most sensitive to extreme variations in weather. While the FAO's 2019 report found there was also a strong correlation between increases in hunger and countries that had suffered an economic slowdown. Many thousands of organisations are engaged in the field of hunger relief; operating at local, national, regional or international levels. Some of these organisations are dedicated to hunger relief, while others may work in a number of different fields. The organisations range from multilateral institutions, to national governments, to small local initiatives such as independent soup kitchens. Many participate in umbrella networks that connect together thousands of different hunger relief organisations. At the global level, much of the world's hunger relief efforts are coordinated by the UN, and geared towards achieving the 2030 Sustainable Development Goal for 'Zero hunger'. There is only one globally recognized approach for defining and measuring hunger that is generally used by those studying or working to relieve hunger as a social problem. This is the United Nation's FAO measurement, which they typically refer to as undernourishment, sometimes as hunger or 'food deprivation'. For the FAO: Not all of the many thousands of organizations in the hunger relief field use the FAO definition of hunger. Some use a broader definition that overlaps more fully with malnutrition. The alternative definitions do however tend to go beyond the commonly understood meaning of hunger as a painful or uncomfortable motivational condition; the desire for food is something that all humans frequently experience, even the most affluent, and is not in itself a social problem. The physical sensation of hunger is related to contractions of the stomach muscles. These contractions—sometimes called hunger pangs once they become severe—are believed to be triggered by high concentrations of the ghrelin hormone. The hormones Peptide YY and Leptin can have an opposite effect on the appetite, causing the sensation of being full. Ghrelin can be released if blood sugar levels get low—a condition that can result from long periods without eating. Stomach contractions from hunger can be especially severe and painful in children and young adults. Hunger pangs can be made worse by irregular meals. People who cannot afford to eat more than once a day sometimes refuse one-off additional meals, because if they do not eat at around the same time on the next days, they may suffer extra severe hunger pangs. Older people may feel less violent stomach contractions when they get hungry, but still suffer the secondary effects resulting from low food intake: these include weakness, irritability and decreased concentration. Prolonged lack of adequate nutrition also causes increased susceptibility to disease and reduced ability for the body to self heal.