Diarrhea and fever as risk factors for anemia among children under age five living in urban slum areas of Indonesia

OBJECTIVES: To characterize diarrhea and fever as risk factors for anemia among children in developing countries. METHODS: We characterized risk factors for anemia in a sample of 32873 children, aged 6-59 months, from poor families in urban slum areas of Indonesia from 2000 to 2003. RESULTS: The prevalence of anemia was 58.7%. In separate multivariate models, after adjusting for age, sex, stunting, maternal age and education, and weekly per capita household expenditure, current diarrhea (OR 1.20, 95% CI 1.07-1.35, p=0.002), current fever (OR 1.44, 95% CI 1.18-1.75, p<0.0001), and a history of diarrhea in the previous seven days (OR 1.12, 95% CI 1.03-1.23, p=0.024) were associated with an increased risk of anemia. CONCLUSIONS: Diarrhea and fever are important risk factors for anemia among young children living in urban slum communities in Indonesia.