Originally published October 31 2005
Researcher finds new dosage of vitamin A is necessary to protect children from measles
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
Researcher Yang Huiming, associate professor of pediatrics at Sichuan University in China, has found that two mega-doses of vitamin A effectively reduces the fatal risks of measles in two-year-olds.
Two megadoses of vitamin A reduce the risk of dying from measles for children under age 2, according to an updated review of studies.
The results bolster the World Health Organization recommendation that an oral dose of vitamin A be given for two consecutive days to children who live in areas where vitamin A deficiency may exist.
However, the study also found that a single megadose of vitamin A is not effective, although still being used in some parts of the world, according to lead researcher Yang Huiming, associate professor of pediatrics at Sichuan University in China.
The systematic evidence review appears in the current issue of The Cochrane Library, a publication of The Cochrane Collaboration, an international organization that evaluates medical research.
Pneumonia was most common cause of death in children with measles in the four studies that specified cause.
Pooling data from studies that used two doses of vitamin A, comprising 429 hospitalized children, the reviewers found a 67 percent reduction of mortality from pneumonia.
Vitamin A cut the risk of post-measles croup by 41 percent (722 children studied), and of the two studies that addressed post-measles diarrhea (474 children), the one using two doses of vitamin A showed a 65 percent lower risk of developing diarrhea, while the single-dose study did not show reduction.
In developed countries, children are protected from measles by routine vaccination, given as part of the three-way MMR (measles-mumps-rubella) vaccine.
"It's not that the vaccine isn't available; it's that delivery and the cold chain (keeping the vaccine refrigerated) is an issue," said Diane Griffin, chair of molecular microbiology and immunology at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.
Vitamin A deficiency is not an issue in the United States or most other developing countries.
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