Prevalence of multiple micronutrient powders consumption and its determinants among 6- to 23-month-old children in East Africa: a mixed effect analysis using the recent population based cross sectional national health survey.

Background: To address iron deficiency anemia, Multiple Micronutrient Powders (MMNPs) can be sprinkled onto any semisolid diet and given to young children. There is currently no data on actual MMNPs uptake by children; hence, the study's goal was to investigate MMNPs and determinants among children aged 6-23 months in East Africa.

Methods: Data from the 2016-2022 East Africa demographic and health survey extracted from Kids Records (KR) files were used in this study. A total of 33,324 weighted 6- to 23-month-old child samples were included. For assessing model fitness and contrast, the intra-class correlation coefficient, median odds ratio, proportional change in variance, and deviance were used. A multilevel logistic regression model was applied to identify variables that may influence MMNPs intake. In the multivariable multilevel logistic regression analyses, variables were judged to be significantly linked with MMNPs intake if their p-values were < 0.05.

Results: In East Africa, the prevalence of MMNPs intake among infants aged 6-23 months was 6.45% (95% CI, 6.19%, 6.22%). Several factors were found to be significantly associated with MMNPs consumption. These factors include older maternal age (AOR = 1.23, 95% CI, 1.09, 1.39) and (AOR = 1.46, 95% CI, 1.23, 1.73), poorer (AOR = 0.73, 95% CI, 0.64, 0.84), middle (AOR = 0.75, 95% CI, 0.66, 0.86), richer (AOR = 0.61, 95% CI, 0.52, 0.71), and richest (AOR = 0.49, 95% CI, 0.41, 0.59) as compared to poorest, having employment status (AOR = 0.65, 95% CI, 0.59, 0.71), mass media exposure (AOR = 1.61, 95% CI, 1.35, 1.78), longer birth interval (AOR = 1.19, 95% CI, 1.28, 1.36), place of delivery (AOR = 1.46, 95% CI, 1.28,1.66), and mothers from rural areas (AOR = 0.71, 95% CI, 0.62,0.80).

Conclusions: Overall, MMNPs intake was lower than the national and international recommendations. Only seven out of every hundred children received MMNPs. Improving maternal preventive health care and supporting marginalized women will have a positive impact.