Twenty-seven percent of in-school adolescent girls tested in Wayu Tuqa district of East Wollega were anemic, according to a study published on 17 July 2019 in BMC Women’s Health.
A schoolgirl holds her exercise books in Ethiopia, October 2015 (Fofyfo, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0) [file photo]
The researchers, Rediet Takele Regasa of Wollega University and Jemal Ali Haidar of Addis Ababa University’s School of Public Health, tested 448 girls aged 10 to 19 in the district’s schools in February and March 2016. Haemoglobin was measured on the spot with a portable analyser, and girls found to be anemic or malnourished were referred for treatment.
Most cases were mild: 23 percent of the girls had mild anemia and 4 percent moderate anemia. By World Health Organization thresholds, that makes anemia a moderate public health problem among the girls. A third of them were also thin for their age, while 3.6 percent were overweight and 1.4 percent obese.
Older girls were at much greater risk. Girls aged 15 to 19 were almost four times as likely to be anemic as younger girls, and those from rural areas were 3.4 times as likely as those from town. Girls who had started menstruating were about twice as likely to be anemic as those who had not.
Diets were narrow. More than half of the girls had eaten from three or fewer food groups in the previous 24 hours. Only 16.7 percent had eaten meat, a good source of iron, and 12.9 percent eggs. The study did not, however, find a significant link between dietary diversity and anemia.
The rate was higher than the 13.4 percent national figure the authors cited from Ethiopia’s 2011 Demographic and Health Survey. They said the gap may reflect differences in the groups sampled and in sample size.
The authors called on the health and education sectors to work together on nutrition education and counselling in schools, aimed at girls by age and by whether they have begun menstruating. They noted that they could not measure iron, folate or vitamin B12 levels. The study was funded by Addis Ababa University’s School of Public Health.
Sources: BMC Women’s Health