NFHS-5 Survey

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    • Ministry of Health and Family Welfare has recently released the fifth round of the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) Report.

    Key Finding of the Report

    • Under Age marriage:
      • According to the fifth round of National Family Health Survey (NFHS) the national average of underage marriages has come down.
      • 23.3% women got married before attaining the legal age of 18 years from 26.8% reported in NFHS-4. The figure for underage marriage among men is 17.7% (NFHS-5) from 20.3% (NFHS-4).
    • Exceptions: 
    • However, the rate has increased in 5 states Punjab, West Bengal, Manipur, Tripura and Assam.
    • Top performing: 
      • Underage marriages are lowest in J&K, Lakshadweep, Ladakh, Himachal Pradesh, Goa, Nagaland, Kerala, Puducherry and Tamil Nadu, according to NFHS-5.
    • Highest surge: 
      • Tripura witnessed the biggest surge in marriages under the legal age of 18 years for women from 33.1% (NFHS-4) to 40.1%, and from 16.2% to 20.4% among men.
    • Highest rate:
      • West Bengal and Bihar have the highest rate of underage marriages.
      • Bihar saw a marginal decrease from 42.5% (NFHS-4) to 40.8% (NFHS-5) and 35.3% for women and to 30.5% for men.
    • Teenage pregnancy and contraceptive use: 
      • Teenage pregnancies came down from 7.9% to 6.8%. As per report, women who are employed are more likely to use modern contraception.
      • Report noted that contraceptive use has increased in communities and regions that have seen more socioeconomic progress and also with increase in income levels.
      • The contraceptive prevalence rate has increased to 67 percent from 54 percent.
    • Family planning: 
      • The data shows that lack of family planning is highest among the poorest 11.4 percent of the population and lowest among the wealthiest 8.6%.
    • Domestic violence: 
      • It came down from 31.2% in 2015-16 to 29.3% in 2019-21.
    • Total Fertility Rate: 
      • i.e. average number of children per woman has declined from 2.2 (NFHS-4) to 2.0 at the national level.
      • Now, only five states are above the replacement level of fertility of 2.1. These are Bihar (2.98), Meghalaya (2.91), Uttar Pradesh (2.35), Jharkhand (2.26) Manipur (2.17).
    • Institutional births: 
      • Increased from 79% to 89%. For rural areas it is 87% and 94% for urban areas.
    • Increase in obesity: 
      • Obesity has increased from 21% to 24% among women and 19% to 23% among men.
    • Women Empowerment:
      • Their participation in major decisions of the household increased substantially. It is 77 percent for rural areas and 81 percent for urban areas.
      • Women having bank or savings accounts increased to 79 percent from 53 percent in the past four years.
    • Cooking fuel and sanitation:
      • Usage of clean cooking fuel improved to 59 percent from 44 percent.
      • Sanitation facilities improved to 70 percent from 49 percent.

    About NFHS-5

    • The NFHS-5 survey was conducted in around 6.37 lakh sample households from 707 districts of the country from 28 States and 8 UTs.
    • The NFHS-5 data showed an overall improvement in SDG indicators in all States/UTs.
    • The NFHS-5 has captured the data from 2019-20. There was a delay in the report because of the Covid-19.
    • Novelty in the 5th round of the survey: It included new focal areas this time:
      • expanded domains of child immunization
      • components of micro-nutrients to children,
      • menstrual hygiene,
      • frequency of alcohol and tobacco use,
      • additional components of non-communicable diseases (NCDs),
      • expanded age ranges for measuring hypertension and diabetes among all, aged 15 years and above, for strengthening existing programmes and evolving new strategies for policy intervention.

     

    National Family Health Survey (NFHS)

    • About:
      • The National Family Health Survey (NFHS) is a large-scale, multi-round survey conducted in a representative sample of households throughout India.
    • The survey provides state and national information for India on:
      • fertility
      • infant and child mortality
      • the practice of family planning
      • maternal and child health
      • reproductive health
      • nutrition
      • anemia
      • utilization
      • quality of health and family planning services
    • Objective
      • To provide essential data on health and family welfare needed by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and other agencies for policy and programme purposes,
      • To provide information on important emerging health and family welfare issues.
      • Providing evidence for the effectiveness of ongoing programmes
      • Recognising the need for new policies with an area specific focus and identifying groups that are most in need of essential services.
      • It is instrumental in tracking 30 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), India aims to achieve by 2030.
    • Nodal Agency:
      • International Institute for Population Sciences (IIPS) Mumbai is the nodal agency responsible for providing coordination and technical guidance for the survey.
      • IIPS collaborates with a number of Field Organizations (FO) for survey implementation.
    • Funding:
      • The funding for different rounds of NFHS has been provided by USAID, DFID, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, UNICEF, UNFPA, and MOHFW, GOI.
    • Past NFHS:
      • NFHS-1 (1992-93)
      • NFHS-2 (1998-99)
      • NFHS-3 (2005-2006)
      • NFHS-4 (2014-2015)

    Source: TH

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