A subnational reproductive, maternal, newborn, child, and adolescent health and development atlas of India

Abstract

Understanding the fine scale and subnational spatial distribution of reproductive, maternal, newborn, child, and adolescent health and development indicators is crucial for targeting and increasing the efficiency of resources for public health and development planning. National governments are committed to improve the lives of their people, lift the population out of poverty and to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. We created an open access collection of high resolution gridded and district level health and development datasets of India using mainly the 2015-16 National Family Health Survey (NFHS-4) data, and provide estimates at higher granularity than what is available in NFHS-4, to support policies with spatially detailed data. Bayesian methods for the construction of 5 km × 5 km high resolution maps were applied for a set of indicators where the data allowed (36 datasets), while for some other indicators, only district level data were produced. All data were summarised using the India district administrative boundaries. In total, 138 high resolution and district level datasets for 28 indicators were produced and made openly available.

Fig. 1

Schematic overview of the data processing method adopted to generate 5 km × 5 km high resolution and district level reproductive, maternal, newborn, child, and adolescent health and development datasets in India.

Fig. 2

Flow chart outlining the model constructing, fitting, and validating process of the health and development indicators. (a) The DHS geolocated household survey dataset of iron tablets or syrup received during antenatal care visits. (b) Geospatial covariates stack at the 1 × 1 km resolution. (c) Prediction (mean) surface for antenatal iron or syrup coverage at the 5 km × 5 km resolution. (d) Uncertainty (standard deviation) for antenatal iron or syrup coverage at the 5 km × 5 km resolution.

Fig. 3

5 km × 5 km high-resolution (panel a) and district level summary (mean) (panel b) for the percentage of women receiving iron tablets or syrup during ANC visits.