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Iron status, haemoglobinopathies and malarial infection were assessed in a representative sample of 2,968 subjects living in three rural districts and two urban districts of South Benin. Iron deficiency, defined by two or more abnormal values in the 4 independent indicators of iron status used (transferrin saturation, erythrocyte protoporphyrin, serum ferritin and mean corpuscular volume) was present in 31% of subjects. Anaemia (according to WHO references values) was found in 73.6% of them. Fifty-two percent of anaemias were associated with biochemical evidence of iron deficiency. Prevalence of iron deficiency and iron-deficiency anaemia was higher in children and menstruating women. There was no difference between rural and urban groups, except for children 73–168 months old, in whom the prevalence was higher in the rural group. Sickle cell trait was present in 21% of subjects and Plasmodium falciparum trophozoites were found in the blood of 96.5% of subjects. The frequency of anaemia was not correlated with the degree of malarial infection nor to the type of haemoglobin.

Etude faite au Benin; des trophozoites de plasmodium falciparum sont rencontres dans 96% des cas. La concentration de ferritine serique est le parametre le plus affecte par l'existence de l'inflammation

A transversal survey has been performed in the Zou Province in the central part of Benin located in West Africa close to the western border of Nigeria. The Zou Province is an agricultural region which population is about 900,000. A randomised sample of 1936 people had been chosen according 1,984 census data. All the samples have been examined by ELISA Rapid Elavia Mixt (Pasteur Vaccin). All positive samples have been tested with both Elavia I and Elavia II (Pasteur Vaccin). 6.6% of sampled population show positive result for HIV1 in ELISA and 0.9% are positive in ELISA for HIV2. Age, sex and geographical distribution of ELISA positive samples is quite uniform. None of positive plasma in ELISA can be interpreted as positive in Western-Blot. The first hypothesis discussed by authors is possibility of serological conversion occurring at the time of the survey. If this unlikely hypothesis is confirmed it means that both viruses have recently and suddenly infected the Zou Province at various level of population and in all villages of the Province. A second hypothesis is that all plasma have antibodies for unidentified related virus which cross reacts with HIV1 or HIV2. A third hypothesis is that dysproteinaemia due to parasite or nutrition factors produce false positive reactions. This could explain such a positive reaction distribution among the whole population. So the last hypothesis must be considered with attention.