Anaemia
Study location: Tiruvannamalai district in Tamilnadu. Study period: 8 months Study population: Women agricultural workers who work in the fields doing agricultural labour. Design: A randomized controlled study to observe the efficacy of the multiple micronutrient fortified salt in reducing anaemia and fatigue in women agricultural workers. Randomization: Villages where women agricultural workers reside will be chosen for the study. The names of all the villages comprising about 150 households where women agricultural workers reside, will be fed into a computer and we will choose the random village or villages assigned by the computer to be the experimental or control group. The experimental group which contains 150 households will receive the fortified salt. The control group containing 150 households will continue to use the salt they have been conventionally using. Hemoglobin will be tested in the women in the experimental and control groups and they will also answer a fatigue questionnaire. Deworming: All members of all the households enrolled in the study in both the experimental and control groups will be given a tablet of albendazole (400 mg) at baseline, after 4 months and post intervention after 8 months. Deworming will be done thrice in the study period of 8 months. Deworming will be done to ensure that there were no worms competing for the micronutrients and that the intestinal tract was clear for absorption of the micronutrients. Experimental and control groups: The 150 households in the experimental villages will receive the multiple micronutrient fortified salt for a period of 8 months. The households in the control villages will continue to use the conventional salt they were using before the study. Blood samples will be collected from the adult women who are agricultural workers from 150 households in the experimental group and 150 households in the control group. Blood samples will be collected in all the participants (only the women agricultural
The women have to be agricultural workers in the age range 18 years to 55 years
This study excluded the families where the women did not provide written informed consent. Women who had a hemoglobin level less than 8 grams/dL(defined as severe anemia) will be excluded from the study to enable immediate medical intervention for them.