“… 17,18 Indeed, these and our subsequent studies suggested that diarrheal illnesses in the first 1–2 years of life may account for a persisting 4 cm shortfall of growth (∼8.2 cm when the effects of intestinal helminths in just the first 2 years of life are included) 19,20 . Similar findings of an important impact of diarrhea on childhood growth have been made in Guatemala, West Africa, Mexico, and Bangladesh 21–26 . When challenged by the argument that catch‐up growth reverses the growth impairment of isolated diarrheal illnesses, 27 analyses of weight gains following a diarrheal illness in our studies in Brazil revealed that recurrent diarrhea reduced weight and, albeit less significantly, height gains by 48% and 21%, respectively, when compared with children who did not have recurrent diarrhea 17,18,28,29 (Table 1).…”