Survey completed 6 months ago, but anaemia data not released

Anaemia was dropped from the sixth National Family Health survey launched in 2023 saying that it will be surveyed more scientifically in the Diet and Biomarkers Survey in India (DABS-I) launched in December 2022. However, the anaemia prevalence data from DABS-I is yet to be made public though it was completed in November 2025. According to experts who have been part of DABS-I, the anaemia report is ready but the timing of the release is in the hands of the government.

Controversy over dropping anaemia from NFHS-6 has come to the fore with the release of the NFHS fact sheets over a week back. The government had come in for sharp criticism after the last NFHS conducted in 2019-21 showed a sharp increase in the proportion of children and women who were anaemic. The proportion of adolescent girls who were anaemic had risen from 54% in the 2015-16 survey to almost 60%. Similarly, 67% of children less than five years old were anaemic as were 52% of pregnant women.

Even as the government faced criticism for the failure of its nutrition and iron tablet distribution programmes in bringing down anaemia, many questioned the ‘inexplicable’ rise in anaemia. Several experts argued that such high incidence of anaemia could be due to faulty methodology being used by the NFHS in estimating anaemia.

According to experts who were part of meetings of the health ministry and Niti Aayog in which the decision to drop anaemia from NFHS was taken, the problem with NFHS estimation was that it used blood drawn from a finger prick which could show results that varied by almost a gram per decilitre of blood. They referred to published data which showed that one gets a higher haemoglobin estimate in venous blood (when blood samples are drawn from veins) compared to capillary samples (drawn from finger prick). Using venous samples is said to be the gold standard to estimate anaemia.

The DABS-I survey, now renamed Survey for Assessment of Markers of Population Health, Activity, Diet and Anthropometry (SAMPADA), which covered 2.6 lakh persons compared to the NFHS sample of almost 7 lakh persons, has used venous samples to estimate anaemia. According to some involved in DABS-I/SAMPADA, it shows much lower incidence of anaemia than NFHS-5. However, it cannot be compared with the earlier NFHS findings as the methodology used differs.

SAMPADA’s anaemia data could be comparable with the data from the Comprehensive National Nutrition Survey (CNNS) of 2016-18 as that too used venous blood samples. CNNS conducted by the health ministry with support from UNICEF and the Population Council, an international non-profit organization, is the largest national micronutrient and malnutrition study in India covering over 1.1 lakh pre-schoolers, school-age children, and adolescents in rural and urban areas across 30 states.

It showed that anaemia was most prevalent (>50%) among both children under two years of age and thereafter decreased steadily by 11 years of age to about 15%. It also showed that anaemia was more prevalent among female adolescents 12 years of age and older ( about 40%) compared to their male counterparts (about 18%). This was much less than what NFHS-5 had estimated.

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