The Contribution of Dietary and Non-Dietary Factors to Socioeconomic Inequality in Childhood Anemia in Ethiopia: A Regression-Based Decomposition Analysis Publisher Pubmed



Mohammed SH¹ ; Habtewold TD² ; Muhammad F³ ; Esmaillzadeh A^{1, 4, 5} Show Affiliations
Source: BMC Research Notes Published:2019

Abstract

Objective: There is a scarcity of evidence on socioeconomic inequalities of childhood anemia in Ethiopia. We determined the magnitude of socioeconomic inequality in anemia and the contribution of dietary and non-dietary factors to the observed inequality, using a nationally representative data of 2902 children included in the 2016 Ethiopian demographic and health survey. The data were collected following a multistage, stratified cluster sampling strategy. We followed the Blinder-Oaxaca regression-based approach to decompose the inequality and determine the relative contribution (%) of the dietary and non-dietary factors to the observed inequality. Result: We found a significant pro-poor socioeconomic inequality in childhood anemia in Ethiopia. A third (~ 33%) of the inequality was attributable to compositional differences in the dietary determinants of anemia (dietary diversity, meal frequency, and breastfeeding factors). Non-dietary factors like residence place, maternal education, and birth weight) jointly explained ~ 36% of the inequality. Maternal education was the single most important factor, accounting alone for ~ 28% the inequality, followed by rural residence (~ 17%) and dietary diversity (~ 16%). Efforts to narrow socioeconomic gaps and/or designing equity sensitive interventions by prioritizing the poor in health/nutrition interventions stands worth of consideration to reduce the burden of childhood anemia in Ethiopia and beyond. © 2019 The Author(s).