The recent article on this subject was informative and useful(1). However, I would like to make the following observations:

The prevalence of iodine deficiency dis-orders in a community are assessed by three indicators:(i) Prevalence of goiter which indicates past iodine status of population; (ii) Urinary iodine excretion which indicates current iodine nutriture; and (iii) Iodine content of salt consumed by the population, which indicates the current intake of iodine. Also, the recommended age for inclusion in the survey is 6-12 years. This age group has been advocated to be used all over the world to bring uniformity in the results and comparability in the magnitude of the problem and also to assess the impact of interventions to prevent IDD in subsequent surveys. The authors of the paper have used children in the age group of 1-15 years which is not the recommended age group. They have collected data on 1121 children from the district Dang and only 242 children from district Baroda. The sample size is too small to make any scientifically valid interpretation, particularly, for the district Baroda. The author has classified the urinary iodine excretion values as per the criteria recommended by International Council for Iodine Deficiency Disorders. The World Health Organization has not given any recommendation on inter-pretation of the UIE levels more than 300 mcg/L.

The authors have not described the iodine content of the salt in the two districts which is essential to have a complete picture of the National Iodine Deficiency Disorders (IDD) in the region. They have also not provided any distribution of iodine content of water collected from different villages. It is difficult to make any interpretation on status of IDD without availability of data on these indicators. Also, the median urinary iodine excretion level for each district has not been mentioned. This is essential before identifying a district as being endemic for IDD. The conclusions of the research article have not been based on the data collected by investigators and hence are not scientifically valid. I request the investi-gators to provide these details to have a correct picture of the IDD in the region.