Delivering Scale
What began as regional initiatives has evolved into a global effort to accelerate awareness, screenings, and innovation around the world with the goal to help catalyse systemic change in IDA prevention.
If we imagine that same morning again with a small child at a breakfast table.
This time, families understand what Iron Deficiency Anemia is, what signs to look for, and why early awareness matters.
Instead of discovering IDA only if and after symptoms appear, parents are better equipped to have informed conversations with healthcare providers and to understand the role nutrition and early screening can play in prevention.
The answer does not rest on families alone. Lowering barriers to early detection by embedding simple, non-invasive screening into everyday life and routine healthcare so parents and providers can identify risk earlier outside traditional clinical settings.
Everyday products, available in local stores, are also designed differently: fortified with iron and developed through advances in food science to help the body absorb and use that iron effectively.
Foods become part of a quiet, consistent approach to supporting a child’s health long before iron deficiency becomes severe.
At the same time, the system around the family begins to evolve.
Doctors and midwives are no longer relying only on late-stage testing because they have access to better tools earlier: simple questionnaires, digital inputs, and AI-supported insights that help identify risk earlier through patterns in diet, growth, and behavior.
This gives healthcare providers greater confidence about when to intervene while helping families engage earlier and more proactively with care.
Iron Deficiency Anemia is solvable and preventable. We understand the science. We have the tools. What has been missing is the ability to connect early awareness with simple, everyday action across both households and healthcare systems.
And that’s what makes this moment different.
Four shifts that now make the IDA crisis solvable.
1
ACCESSIBLE, NON-INVASIVE TECHNOLOGY
Expanding access to screening through connected solutions
IDA screening has shifted from invasive blood draws to increasingly scalable technologies. Non-invasive hemoglobin devices can be used to deliver results in minutes, while questionnaires and smartphone-based AI imaging further reduce cost, complexity, and barriers to access. Together, these tools can strengthen the screening ecosystem to support HCPs, partners, and caregivers to identify risk earlier, reach more children, and connect families to the right guidance and expertise to act.
2
MULTI-STAKEHOLDER COORDINATION
Global health financing is re-thinking itself
The 2024–2026 period has seen global health architecture shift, with greater focus on nutrition, integration of food and health systems, and expanded private-sector engagement. Initiatives like Nutrition for Growth 2030 are creating opportunities to embed IDA targets into donor and multilateral commitments, alongside broader food-health partnerships prioritising prevention, nutrition, and maternal and child health.
3
GROWING AWARENESS AND ABILITY TO TAKE ACTION
Scale has been demonstrated
Accessible, non-invasive technology and stronger multi-stakeholder coordination now make it possible to increase awareness of and prevention of IDA across health and consumer ecosystems, particularly in priority markets.
4
EVIDENCE OF THE HUMAN AND ECONOMIC COST
The scientific case is now complete
Economic burden data, clinical consensus, and RCT-level evidence have all emerged in the past decade. Studies now link infant and child iron status to cognitive, developmental, and long-term health outcomes, quantify IDA’s impact on GDP, and provide evidence-based screening protocols. The science is established; the challenge is translating it into policy and action.
Local Partnerships and Campaigns:
Making the Invisible Visible
Malaysia is an excellent example of an IronUp! market where commercial, medical, scientific, and advocacy efforts operate as a single integrated system. Professor Yazid, the country’s leading IDA key opinion leader, plays a central role by shaping discourse through medical forums, policy engagement, and media, with growing global use of his video content to extend reach.
The ecosystem spans major national stakeholders, including medical associations, government bodies, and NGOs, and has delivered concrete outcomes such as a 2024 expert consensus on infant screening, a pilot in government clinics, and a multi-stakeholder roundtable to develop a national IDA white paper. This is underpinned by the Iron Strong Study, the country’s key prevalence evidence base.
On the consumer side, the Iron Strong Generation campaign translated clinical urgency into brand storytelling, improving both awareness and health impact.
Iron Champions: Partnerships that Promote an Iron Strong Generation
Didier Drogba joins the IronUp! program as a new ambassador in Africa!
Danone is proud to announce a new partnership between Danone and Didier Drogba, who is joining Danone in the fight against childhood Iron Deficiency Anemia, one of the most widespread and preventable health challenges affecting 1 out of 3 young children in Africa¹.
This partnership builds on Danone’s longstanding commitment to bringing health through food to families across Africa, at every stage. Supported as well by our belief in the power of sport as a force for health, inspiration and social progress.
Source: ¹ World Health Organization. Anemia in women and children (WHO 2019)
Three features of a world where children are not at risk for IDA.
1
All children undergo their first screening for anemia between the ages 9 and 12 months, followed by annual non-invasive screenings from the ages 1 to 5 years.
Smartphone-based and digital screening is accessible so that the marginal cost of reaching each child is close to zero. Through tools such as the IronQ, the IronUp! Checker, or non-invasive Hb devices, screening prioritizes preventative care and is embedded into existing touchpoints including vaccination days, maternal care visits, and routine child-health monitoring systems.
How would this work?
2
IDA is a national health KPI.
Reported alongside child mortality, stunting, and vaccination coverage. Finance Ministries receive annual cost-of-inaction updates.
How would this work?
3
Iron-rich foods are the norm.
Parents understand the importance of fortification and how iron is absorbed in the body. They know what to introduce at 6 months — guided by HCPs, campaigns, and the packaging on the food they buy.
How would this work?
A Call to Action
Progress at scale requires public–private partnerships and coalitions that bring together actors who don’t always work side by side—governments, maternal and child health programmes, healthcare professionals, NGOs, philanthropies, and international organisations—so that screening reliably connects to confirmation, care, and addressing underlying causes. We see each actor playing a complementary role in building this system, and we believe collaboration can unlock impact at scale.
GOVERNMENTS
Strengthen and embed the policy.
We see an opportunity to work with governments to integrate IDA into national health strategies, define clear reduction goals, and consider pathways to make screening part of standard preventative care, where appropriate.
NGOs / UN
Extend the reach into communities.
Field-based organisations and health implementers are already present in many of the critical early-life touchpoints (such as the 6-24 month window). We believe there is an opportunity to work together to integrate simple screening tools into existing programs and help close the identification gap that no single actor can address alone.
PHILANTHROPY
Co-fund the evidence and unlock scale for impact.
We see philanthropy as a key partner in supporting the generation of robust evidence and validation, helping to fund clinical validation of our IronUp! Checker, country-level burden research, and rigorously design impact evaluations. This type of catalytic funding can help unlock subsequent public and private investment at scale.
PRIVATE SECTOR
Build enabling systems and pathways.
The children whose cognitive potential is shaped in early life are the future of our economies and societies. There is an opportunity for the private sector to contribute to improve early detection and outcomes for IDA where commercial capabilities align with improved health outcomes for children.
If you’d like to be a part of this movement, or have questions or comments about the IronUp! program, please contact us here.
Imagine a world where families have access to iron-rich foods and children are screened for IDA.
The answer can be simple and already within reach: formulated milk, cereals, granola bars - everyday products available in local stores designed to be fortified with iron, built through advances in food science to ensure a child’s body can absorb and use iron effectively.
Not a treatment or a disruption, but something that becomes a norm in the household. A quiet, consistent way of supporting a child’s health before there is ever a problem.
At the same time, the system around the family begins to evolve.
Doctors and midwives are no longer relying only on late-stage testing because they have access to better tools, simple questionnaires, digital inputs, and AI-supported screening that help them understand risk earlier through patterns in diet, growth, and behavior.
This strengthens clinical care and gives medical providers more confidence ito act without needing to wait for a blood test.
These shifts create a connected system that allows mothers and medical professionals to anticipate, support, and prevent iron deficiency from the start of a child’s life.
This world can be a reality because Iron Deficiency Anemia is a condition we can prevent.
Join IronUp! in fighting for an iron strong generation.
