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Study: Prenatal supplements fail to meet nutrient needs
Although drugstore shelves might suggest otherwise,affordable dietary supplements that provide critical nutrients in appropriate doses for pregnant women are virtually nonexistent, researchers have found.
In a new study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, investigators observed what many physicians have long suspected: Most prenatal vitamins and other supplements do not adequately make up the difference of what food-based intake of nutrients leave lacking. Despite patients believing they are getting everything they need with their product purchase, they fall short of guideline-recommended requirements.
“There is no magic pill,” said Katherine A. Sauder, PhD, an associate professor of pediatrics at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, Aurora, and lead author of the study. “There is no easy answer here.”
The researchers analyzed 24-hour dietary intake data from 2,450 study participants across five states from 2007 to 2019. Dr. Sauder and colleagues focused on six of the more than 20 key nutrients recommended for pregnant people and determined the target dose for vitamin A, vitamin D, folate, calcium, iron, and omega-3 fatty acids.
The researchers tested more than 20,500 dietary supplements, of which 421 were prenatal products. Only 69 products—three prenatal—included all six nutrients. Just seven products —two prenatal—contained target doses for five nutrients. Only one product, which was not marketed as prenatal, contained target doses for all six nutrients but required seven tablets a serving and cost patients approximately $200 a month.
SARS-CoV-2 crosses placenta and infects brains of two infants: ‘This is a first’
Researchers have found for the first time that COVID infection has crossed the placenta and caused brain damage in two newborns, according to a study published online today in Pediatrics.
One of the infants died at 13 months and the other remained in hospice care at time of manuscript submission.
Lead author Merline Benny, MD,with the division of neonatology, department of pediatrics at University of Miami, and colleagues briefed reporters today ahead of the release.
“This is a first,” said senior author Shahnaz Duara, MD, medical director of the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit at Holtz Children’s Hospital, Miami, explaining it is the first study to confirm cross-placental SARS-CoV-2 transmission leading to brain injury in a newborn.
Both infants negative for the virus at birth
The two infants were admitted in the early days of the pandemic in the Delta wave to the neonatal ICU at Holtz Children’s Hospital at University of Miami/Jackson Memorial Medical Center.
Both infants tested negative for the virus at birth, but had significantly elevated SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in their blood, indicating that either antibodies crossed the placenta, or the virus crossed and the immune response was the baby’s.
Dr. Benny explained that the researchers have seen, to this point, more than 700 mother/infant pairs in whom the mother tested positive for COVID in Jackson hospital.
Most who tested positive for COVID were asymptomatic and most of the mothers and infants left the hospital without complications.
“However, (these) two babies had a very unusual clinical picture,” Dr. Benny said.
Those infants were born to mothers who became COVID positive in the second trimester and delivered a few weeks later.
Perinatal HIV nearly eradicated in U.S.
Rates of perinatal HIV have dropped so much that the disease is effectively eliminated in the United States, with less than 1 baby for every 100,000 live births having the virus, a new study released by researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention finds.
The report marks significant progress on the U.S. government’s goal to eradicate perinatal HIV, an immune-weakening and potentially deadly virus that is passed from mother to baby during pregnancy. Just 32 children in the country were diagnosed in 2019, compared with twice as many in 2010, according to the CDC.
Mothers who are HIV positive can prevent transmission of the infection by receiving antiretroviral therapy, according to Monica Gandhi, MD, MPH, a professor of medicine at University of California, San Francisco’s division of HIV, infectious disease and global medicine.
Dr. Gandhi said she could recall only one case of perinatal HIV in the San Francisco area over the last decade.