Vitamin D link with childhood asthma

Higher levels of vitamin D during pregnancy may lower the risk of wheezing and asthma in early childhood.

For over three years, researchers at Harvard Medical School assessed the vitamin D levels during the pregnancies of over 1300 women in the northeastern US where vitamin D deficiency and asthma are common. By age two, there was a clear association between increasing prenatal levels of vitamin D in the mother and decreasing risk of wheezing or doctor-diagnosed asthma in the child.

The average total vitamin D intake during pregnancy was 550 international units (IU) per day, and it didn’t matter whether the vitamin D came from either diet or nutritional supplements.

In New Zealand, we get most of our vitamin D through sun exposure. Good food sources of vitamin D include fish liver oils, fatty fish, margarines, eggs, and beef or lamb liver.

Source: Annual meeting American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (June 2006)