Adolescent health in India and development implications

Constituting more than one fifth of the country’s population, adolescents in India, as a group, have not yet received the deserved attention. This paper examines the health status of adolescents in India based on existing studies and highlights the implications for development of adolescents as well as for national development. It has a special focus on some of the neglected aspects of adolescent health: nutritional situation, substance use and mental health. The review shows that the nutritional situation of adolescents is probably diagonally opposite to what we would perceive based on their mortality rates. A majority of them do not get adequate nutrition, not necessarily always because they cannot afford it. Many suffer from nutritional deficiency diseases, and eating habits are unhealthy. Substance use among them is high and so is the prevalence of symptoms of mental health problems. The paper stresses the need to have a special focus on adolescent health going beyond reproductive health issues that are generally directed at married adolescent girls.