VOA慢速英语2011-Health Report - Iron, Vitamin D May Lead

This is the VOA Special English Health Report.

Many people have low iron in their blood. But pregnant women need extra iron for their own health and their baby's health. Iron is important to the development of a baby's brain and central nervous system.

In poor countries, however, providing all pregnant women with iron supplements can be a financial issue. Some experts say giving supplements to babies after they are born is enough.

Someone who disagrees is Parul Christian¹, a nutritionist at the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health in Maryland. She and other scientists have been doing research in Nepal. She says their latest findings should settle any question about the value of making sure every pregnant woman receives iron supplements.

Iron is a micronutrient. Micronutrients are important substances that are found in small amounts in foods.

The researchers first completed a study among poor women in Nepal ten years ago. During pregnancy² some of the women received supplements containing iron and another micronutrient, folic acid.

Professor Christian says that study showed the supplements could improve child survival.

A new international study finds vitamin D can lower the risk of respiratory infections in babies

Now the children are older. The researchers returned to Nepal and tested their neurological development. They found improved intellectual and fine motor abilities among those whose mothers had received iron and folic acid during pregnancy and for three months after.

The findings appear in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Another new study, published in the journal Pediatrics, looks at levels of vitamin D in babies. It says newborns with the lowest levels were twice as likely to develop respiratory infections as those with normal levels of vitamin D.

Vitamin D helps build strong bones and strengthens the body's defenses against disease. The vitamin is commonly added to cow's milk and also found in supplements. But vitamin D is called the sunshine vitamin. The body naturally produces it from sunlight.

Carlos Camargo from Harvard Medical School in Massachusetts and other researchers did the study. It followed more than nine hundred children in New Zealand until they were five years old.

CARLOS CAMARGO: "And what we found was that children who had the lowest levels of vitamin D had a high risk of developing infections and wheezing³ throughout childhood."

He says the problem of vitamin D deficiency is not limited to countries with the least sun.

CARLOS CAMARGO: "People are moving more and more indoors. And they work indoors. They play indoors. Everything’s indoors. And so we’re actually starting to see low levels of vitamin D in areas where the sun is plentiful⁴."

And that's the VOA Special English Health Report. I'm Steve Ember.

1 Christian   

adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒

参考例句：

• They always addressed each other by their Christian name.他们总是以教名互相称呼。
• His mother is a sincere Christian.他母亲是个虔诚的基督教徒。

2 pregnancy   

n.怀孕，怀孕期

参考例句：

• Early pregnancy is often accompanied by nausea.怀孕早期常有恶心的现象。
• Smoking during pregnancy increases the risk of miscarriage.怀孕期吸烟会增加流产的危险。

3 wheezing   

v.喘息，发出呼哧呼哧的喘息声( wheeze的现在分词 )；哮鸣

参考例句：

• He was coughing and wheezing all night. 他整夜又咳嗽又喘。
• A barrel-organ was wheezing out an old tune. 一架手摇风琴正在呼哧呼哧地奏着一首古老的曲子。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

4 plentiful   

adj.富裕的，丰富的

参考例句：

• Their family has a plentiful harvest this year.他们家今年又丰收了。
• Rainfall is plentiful in the area.这个地区雨量充足。