Haemoglobin variants and anaemia among pre-school/school children in north-east Brazil

In this study we investigated the presence of haemoglobin (Hb) variants and anaemia among 382 pre-school/school children from Bahia State, Brazil, a state where intermixing involving people from African origin is the highest in the country. Hb variants were investigated by cellulose acetate electrophoresis at alkaline pH. The pattern obtained was confirmed by citrate agar electrophoresis at pH 6.2. From the 382 children investigated, 79 (20.7%) had Hb variants: 47 (59.5%) had HbAS, 28 (35.4%) HbAC, 3 (3.8%) HbSC and 1 (1.3%) HbCC. Two hundred and fourteen children had anaemia. From these, 39 had microcytosis and 14 had low values of ferritin (<12 ng/ml). We cannot exclude thalassaemia among the children with microcytosis and hypochromia because it was not investigated. The majority of the children showed high mean values of ferritin, suggestive of subclinical infection. There was no difference when we compared the prevalence of anaemia among children with Hb variants (65.8%) and those without Hb variants (53.5%) (P = 0.06). These data demonstrate that Hb variants and anaemia are probably important public health problems in north-east Brazil.