Perhaps I did not make myself clear. I am talking about malnutrition of N. Korean scale or those people you see in bad African drought. It will lead to a host of health problem, including shortened lifespan.
My understanding of famine is that many people actually die of starvation.
Yes there are north koreans who had enough calories but died from malnutrition. Supposedly a lot of the people who died this way were holding on by eating corn, which has calories but is very low in nutrients. The ones who had access to rice, even some rice, were much more likely to survive