Table 1.

Distribution of study variables from 2010 to 2019 DHS data of 31 sub-Saharan African countries.

Variable	Weighted N	Weighted %	Variable	Weighted N	Weighted %
Key outcome variables			Household characteristics
Stunting	40,453	31	Wealth status
Wasting	10,770	8	Poor	54,734	42
Underweight	22,503	17	Middle	26,262	20
			Rich	48,650	38
Key predictor variable			Age of household head
Maternal marital status			Young-adults	55,803	43
Single	14,071	11	Middle-aged adults	56,748	44
Married	2645	2	Old-aged adults	17,094	13
Type of cooking fuel	102,192	79	Sex of household head
Clean Unclean	10,725	8	Male	103,254	80
Child characteristics			Female	26,392	20
Age			Access to electricity
0	39,906	31	No	89,364	69
1	36,828	28	Yes	40,272	31
2	26,214	20	Type of toilet facility
3	16,128	12	Improved	55,247	43
4	10,571	8	Unimproved	74,375	57
Sex			Source of drinking water
Male	65,442	50	Improved	85,103	66
Female	64,204	50	Unimproved	44,531	34
Birth order			Type of cooking fuel
1	25,421	20	Unclean	116,263	90
2 to 4	62,426	48	Clean	13,369	10
5 and above	41,799	32	Access to media (tv/radio/newspaper)
Perceived size at birth			No	45,684	35
Large	43,855	34	Yes	83,962	65
Average	64,360	50	Contextual factors
Small	21,422	17	Urbanicity
Weight at birth			Urban	43,412	33
Underweight	7180	6	Rural	86,234	67
Normal	72,089	56	Country
Not taken	50,377	39	Angola	7384	6
Stunting			Benin	15,857	12
Severely/moderately stunting	40,454	31	Burkina Faso	8908	7
No stunting	89,192	69	Burundi	4174	3
Wasting			Cameroon	2936	2
Severely/moderately wasting	10,770	8	Chad	6114	5
No wasting	118,876	92	Comoros	1523	1
Underweight			Congo	2620	2
Not underweight	107,136.99	83	Cote d’Ivoire	2190	2
Underweight	22,503.33	17	DR Congo	4842	4
Mother’s characteristics			Ethiopia	6585	5
Maternal marital status			Gabon	1998	2
single	16,718	13	Gambia	746	1
Married	112,928	87	Ghana	1908	1
Maternal Age			Guinea	2291	2
15–19	9230	7	Kenya	6082	5
20–49	120,416	93	Lesotho	1018	1
Educational attainment			Liberia	2035	2
No education	54,150	42	Malawi	4035	3
Primary	40,339	31	Mali	5785	4
Secondary	31,071	24	Namibia	1155	1
Higher	4086	3	Nigeria	7502	6
Working status			Rwanda	4424	3
No	46,034	36	Senegal	1989	2
Yes	83,505	64	Siera Leone	3052	2
Antenatal visits during pregnancy			South Africa	877	1
No	13,711	11	Tanzania	6088	5
Yes	113,765	88	Togo	2227	2
Dont’ know	2153	2	Uganda	2900	2
Postnatal check within 2 months			Zambia	6402	5
No	75,893	59	Zimbabwe	4000	3
Yes	53,753	41	Geographic region
Place of delivery			Western Africa	54,489	42
Home	40,300	31	Eastern Africa	42,213	33
Health facility	87,846	68	Central Africa	25,894	20
Other	1494	1	South Africa	7051	5
			Total	129,646