Abstract: Objective To know the urinary iodine levels of school-age children at 8-10 years old in Yixian in 2012. Methods Five towns were selected at random in the range of the county according to azimuth (east, west, south, north and center). One elementary school was randomly chosen in every town of the ifve. And 20 urine samples of children at 8-10 years old were randomly drawn in every school selected and the iodine contents were determined through arsenic cerium catalytic spectrophotometric method. Results 240 urine samples of school-age children in 2012 were detected, The median urinary iodine was 256.67μg/L. The urinary iodine contents of the samples below 100μg/L were less than 50%, and the ones below 50μg/L were less than 20%. Overall, the highest values of urinary iodine stayed at between 100-400μg/L, showing positively skewed distribution that was skewed to the right. There was no great disparity in the urinary iodine levels of school aged children from different ages, genders, ethnic and area groups (P>0.05). Conclusion The median urinary iodine is at an appropriate range on school-age children in Yixian. We should continue implementation the new standards of edible salt, and continually strengthen the monitoring and intervention of urinary iodine to achieve the desirable range.

Key words: new standard of edible salt, children 8 to 10 years old, urinary iodine, monitoring