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| Supplements still necessary |
15-Jul-2009 |
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By Daniel Williams
Pregnant women and
those trying to conceive will
still need folic acid and
iodine supplements once
bread is fortified with the
nutrients later this year,
experts recommend.
The advice came as the
food industry prepared to
enrich bread with folic acid
from 13 September, and with
iodine from 9 October, in
response to mandatory standards developed by Food
Standards Australia New
Zealand (FSANZ).
Professor Creswell Eastman, chairman of the Australian Centre for Control of
Iodine Deficiency Disorders,
said the addition of iodised
salt to bread would be insufficient to prevent cases of
iodine deficiency, which was
common among school-aged
children and particularly
pregnant women.
“Something I’m pushing
very hard, because the measure is inadequate, is that all
women of childbearing age,
particularly those who are
pregnant, should take an
iodine supplement,” Professor Creswell said.
Without supplementation,
pregnant women would
need to eat roughly two
loaves of fortified bread a
day to obtain the 200-250µg
of iodine they needed,
Professor Eastman said.
Depending on the level of
iodine deficiency, he said,
effects on the child could
range from mild intellectual
impairment to severe mental
retardation.
Meanwhile, folic acid is
being added to bread-making flour to reduce up
to 14% of neural-tube
defect-affected pregnancies,
which currently number
between 300 and 350 in
Australia every year.
Professor Colin Binns,
professor of public health at
Perth’s Curtin University,
said the extra folic acid
women would obtain from
bread would be minimal,
and they should take supplements in the month
before and three months
after conception to reach a
daily dose of 400µg.
“I’m happy to see folic
acid finally being added to
the food supply, but because
the level is going to be
lower than the optimum, it
should really be looked
upon as a safety net
for women who forget to
take a supplement,” Professor Binns said.
WHAT TO TELL YOUR PATIENTS
* Folic acid supplements containing at least 400μg should be taken every day for one month before and three months after conception.
* Pregnant and breastfeeding women should take daily iodine supplements containing a minimum of 150μg a day, up to a maximum of 250μg.
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