Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what were (1) the age distribution, and (2) gender distribution, of those from whom blood samples were taken for folate status analysis for the recent National Nutrition and Diet Survey supplementary report; and what was the distribution, by country, of places where samples were collected.

The blood folate results published in the National Diet and Nutrition Survey Supplementary Report on 20 March 2015 are based on 2,671 people across the United Kingdom who gave a blood sample. This survey is available at the following link and has also been attached.

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/national-diet-and-nutrition-survey-supplementary-report-blood-folate

Of the people giving a blood sample, 57 were aged 1.5-3 years, 270 were aged 4-10 years, 575 were aged 11-18 years, 1,401 were aged 19-64 years and 368 were aged 65 years or older. 1,214 samples were from males and 1,457 were from females.

656 samples were provided in Scotland, 288 in Wales, 360 in Northern Ireland and 1,367 in England.