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Advice to childbearing-age women: Take more folic acid
February 18, 1997
Web posted at: 10:30 p.m. ESTFrom Correspondent Eugenia Halsey
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Women of childbearing age need more than fruits and vegetables to get enough folic acid to guard against birth defects, a study concludes.
Such women should increase their folic acid intake with either fortified cereal or vitamin supplements, researchers say in this week's Journal of the American Medical Association.
The study says vitamin B can prevent birth defects of the spine and brain. Every year, 2,500 babies in the United States are born with neural tube defects. Medical experts have learned that at least half of these problems could be prevented if pregnant women ingested enough folic acid.
The March of Dimes has been campaigning for years to get women to take folic acid supplements before conception and during the earliest weeks of pregnancy, when the baby's spinal column is forming.
"The only sure way a woman of childbearing age can get enough folic acid is to take a vitamin pill containing folic acid every day," said Dr. Richard Johnston of the March of Dimes.
Folic acid is found naturally in foods such as orange juice, broccoli and spinach. Starting next year, manufacturers will add folic acid to cereal, bread, pasta, rice and flour. Some cereals already are fortified.