NEW DELHI: Claims by drug cartels that vitamin A reduces mortality among children have been disapproved by studies at the national institute of nutrition (NIN) in Hyderabad.
Such claims are propagated to boost sales of vitamin A in the third world, says Dr. C. Gopalan, former director of NIN and president of the nutrition foundation of Indian.
India imports all the vitamin A for its blindness prevention programme. Foreign drug firms are now seeking to further promote its sales by claiming that vitamin A is also a remedy to reduce infant mortality, Dr. Gopalan says.
The sales pitch is based on an isolated small study in Indonesia by American researchers who claimed that vitamin A brought down child mortality by 30 per cent.
Nin director, Dr. Vinodini Reddy said her institute found several loopholes in the study and said that the results were not dependable.
An independent study by NIN has confirmed that vitamin A, while being useful in preventing blindness, plays no role in reducing mortality rates.
Article extracted from this publication >> August 17, 1990
