Anemia prevalence in women of reproductive age in low- and middle-income countries between 2000 and 2018
Published October 12, 2021, in Nature Medicine (opens in a new window)
Abstract
Anemia is a globally widespread condition in women and is associated with reduced economic productivity and increased mortality worldwide. Here we map annual 2000–2018 geospatial estimates of anemia prevalence in women of reproductive age (15–49 years) across 82 low- and middle-income countries (LMICs), stratify anemia by severity and aggregate results to policy-relevant administrative and national levels. Additionally, we provide subnational disparity analyses to provide a comprehensive overview of anemia prevalence inequalities within these countries and predict progress toward the World Health Organization’s Global Nutrition Target (WHO GNT) to reduce anemia by half by 2030. Our results demonstrate widespread moderate improvements in overall anemia prevalence but identify only three LMICs with a high probability of achieving the WHO GNT by 2030 at a national scale, and no LMIC is expected to achieve the target in all their subnational administrative units. Our maps show where large within-country disparities occur, as well as areas likely to fall short of the WHO GNT, offering precision public health tools so that adequate resource allocation and subsequent interventions can be targeted to the most vulnerable populations.
Citation
Kinyoki D, Osgood-Zimmerman AE, Bhattacharjee NV, Local Burden of Disease Anaemia Collaborators, Kassebaum NJ, Hay SI. Anemia prevalence in women of reproductive age in low- and middle-income countries between 2000 and 2018. Nature Medicine. 12 October 2021. doi: 10.1038/s41591-021-01498-0.
Authors
- Damaris Kinyoki,
- Aaron Osgood-Zimmerman,
- Natalia Bhattacharjee,
- Simon Hay,
- Nicholas Kassebaum,
- Lauren Schaeffer,
- Alice Lazzar-Atwood,
- Sam Ewald,
- Katie Donkers,
- Ian Letourneau,
- Michael Collison,
- Megan Schipp,
- Aubrey Cook,
- Elizabeth Cromwell,
- Lalit Dandona,
- Rakhi Dandona,
- Farah Daoud,
- Lucas Earl,
- Nathaniel Henry,
- Julia Hon,
- Kimberly Johnson,
- Kate LeGrand,
- Benjamin Mayala,
- Ali Mokdad,
- Mohsen Naghavi,
- Brandon Pickering,
- Bobby Reiner,
- Alyssa Sbarra,
- Emma Spurlock,
- Mingyou Yang
Datasets
All our datasets are housed in our data catalog, the Global Health Data Exchange (GHDx). Visit the GHDx to download data from this article.