CharitiesFortify Health — Anaemia Reduction at Scale
Fortify Health — Anaemia Reduction at Scale
Charity

Fortify Health

Anaemia Reduction at Scale

Fortify Health improves public health outcomes and tackles iron-deficiency anaemia at scale in India by enabling millers to easily fortify wheat flour.

Global health and wellbeing

What problem is Fortify Health working on?

Iron-deficiency anemia (IDA) is a major public health and economic issue in India. 67.1% of children between 6-59 months of age and 52.2% of pregnant women in India are anemic, and both of these figures have increased over the past five years. IDA undermines India’s human capital. It impairs cognitive development in children, is one of the leading causes of maternal mortality during childbirth, reduces productivity, and perpetuates cycles of poor health and poverty. IDA alone has been estimated to cost India 1.18% of GDP (25 billion USD) annually.

What does Fortify Health do?

Fortify Health is on a mission to reduce iron-deficiency anemia (IDA) in India by making it hassle-free to fortify wheat flour. Fortification is a highly effective intervention: a 2021 global meta-analysis found that consumption of iron-fortified wheat flour reduced rates of anemia by 27%.

Fortify Health works with both millers that sell their wheat flour in the open market and government partners that provide wheat to vulnerable beneficiaries. Fortify Health provides the following support to millers:

  1. Financial support - provides millers with capital to procure premix, procure microdosers and conduct lab tests, so that millers can overcome cost barriers to fortification;
  2. Technical support - conducts capacity building for mill staff and support millers to obtain and maintain regulatory approval;
  3. Quality assurance and quality control support - monitors mills for quality assurance and quality control purposes, provides supportive supervision and troubleshooting of any issues that arise.

Fortify Health has grown from reaching 410,000 people per month in 2022 to over 11 million in October 2025, they estimate they have averted 25,943 years of life with anemia in the previous 12 months.

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