A study analyzing community-level blood survey data from eight Indian states has revealed that a significant portion of anaemia cases—typically linked to iron deficiency—are instead associated with "other" factors, including low vitamin B12 levels and air pollution. Published in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition, the findings indicate that anaemia caused by iron deficiency accounts for less than a third of the total prevalence.
Researchers from the 'Vitamin B12 India Study' and the Indian Council of Medical Research-National Institute of Nutrition (ICMR-NIN), Hyderabad, have reported that iron deficiency is not the predominant cause of anaemia.
Anaemia, a blood disorder in which healthy red blood cells are insufficient or malfunction, is a public health problem and thought to be worsening, as trends in National Family Health Surveys (NFHS) have revealed, according to the authors.
The researchers noted that the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) does not investigate the causes of anaemia, as it measures haemoglobin using finger-prick-based capillary blood samples. They highlighted findings from the 2019 Comprehensive National Nutrition Survey, which analyzed venous blood samples from Indian children and reported a lower prevalence of anaemia.
The authors pointed out that iron deficiency is often assumed to be the primary cause of anaemia, influencing policy responses to the condition. For the study, a total of 4,613 participants, including teenagers, adults, and the elderly, were recruited from states across northeast, central, east, south, and west India.
"In this venous blood-based survey, the observed prevalence of anaemia for men and women was distinctly lower than that reported in the capillary blood-based NFHS-5 survey for the same states," the authors wrote.