Kadapa: Prevalence of anaemia high in teen pregnancy

Kadapa: Child marriages lead to anaemia in pregnant woman. According to a report, 65 out of 100 pregnant women are suffering from anaemia. From adolescence, they suffer with anaemia due to menstruation. Most of the girls do not know about their health conditions and after marriage they become anaemic.

If haemoglobin is 7 to 11 grams per deciliter in pregnant women, they are anaemic. The Kadapa district medical and health department conducted a survey from 2018 to 2019 March, and recorded 58,412 pregnant women of which 38,090 were identified as having haemoglobin levels of 7 to 11 g/dl. Further, 432 pregnant women have less than 7 g/dl haemoglobin levels.

Those who are identified as anaemic by the medical and health department will be treated as a special category and those who are below 7 g/dl haemoglobin will be sent to the district hospital. Iron sucrose and folic acid tablets will be supplied to the pregnant women who have HB levels 7 to 11 g/dl in their blood.  These pregnant women will be treated as high risk cases and the medical and health department will take care of them up to their delivery.

The district medical officer Dr Umasundari, speaking with this newspaper said, the women from adolescence had to take care of  their health.

“The fact that these women lack nutritional food puts them at the risk of anaemia at the pregnant stage. When a pregnancy is confirmed, women must follow the advice of the doctor and take medicines regularly,” she said.

The integrated child development scheme project director Padmaja, speaking with this newspaper, said, “The government is supplying nutritional food to pregnant women. In fact, three types of nutritional food is being supplied to them.”