National Family Health Survey (NFHS-4) 2015-16: Arunachal Pradesh

Around 26 per cent of the surveyed households were in urban areas, 24 per cent lived in a pucca (permanent) structure, and 89 per cent had electricity. 

The survey of heads of households by religion found that 41 per cent were Christian, 26 per cent were Hindu and 21 per cent were from ‘other’ religions. The survey of heads of households by caste/tribe found that 73 per cent belonged to the Scheduled Tribes, 5 per cent to the Other Backward Classes, 7 per cent to the Scheduled Castes, and 15 per cent to the ‘other’ category. 

88 per cent of children in the 6-17 age group attended school. 

The total fertility rate in Arunachal Pradesh was 2.1 children per woman.

27 per cent of women and 24 per cent of men wanted more sons than daughters.

Knowledge of contraception was almost universal in Arunachal Pradesh. Around 23 per cent of men thought that contraception was “women’s business” and 18 per cent felt that the use of contraception could make a woman promiscuous.

The infant mortality rate in Arunachal Pradesh was 23 deaths before the age of 1 year per 1,000 live births.

Among women who gave birth in the five years preceding the survey, 58 per cent received antenatal care for their last birth from a health professional (a doctor, an auxiliary nurse midwife, a ‘lady health visitor’, a nurse or a midwife).

Before the survey, 38 per cent of children between 12 and 23 months received all the basic vaccinations against six major childhood illnesses (tuberculosis, diphtheria, pertussis, tetanus, polio, and measles), while 20 per cent did not receive any vaccinations at all. 

51 per cent of children between 6 and 59 months, 40 per cent of women and 17 per cent of men were anaemic.

According to self-reports, 1,184 women and 1,155 men per 100,000 (both in the 15-49 age group) had diabetes, and 1,195 women and 297 men per 100,000 in the same age bracket had asthma.

78 per cent of women and 87 per cent of men had heard about HIV/AIDS. Almost 16 per cent of women, who had live births in the five years before the survey and received antenatal care, were tested for HIV.

In the 12 months before the survey, 34 per cent of women (aged 15-49) were employed, as compared to 74 per cent of men in the same age group.

57 per cent of women had a bank or savings account, 59 per cent owned a house (by themselves or with someone else), and 60 per cent had a mobile phone that they used themselves. 

57 per cent of women and 42 per cent of men, who had both completed at least 12 years of schooling, believed that it was justifiable for a husband beat his wife under some circumstances. Around 29 per cent of women (15-49) had experienced physical or sexual violence, and only 2 per cent of these women sought help from the police.

Focus and Factoids by Imsutula Jamir.

PARI Library's health archive project is part of an initiative supported by the Azim Premji University to develop a free-access repository of health-related reports relevant to rural India.