Vitamin A deficiency increases risk of infectious diseases, including the human immunodeficiency virus. Vitamin A deficiency is a global epidemic among pregnant women in developing countries who can transmit HIV to their children. HIV can cause AIDS, also called acquired immune deficiency syndrome, a disease that impairs the immune system's ability to fight infections and is associated with a high death rate. Vitamin A may reduce risk of HIV complications.
Vitamin A
Vitamin A, known as an anti-infective vitamin, plays a vital role in normal functioning of the immune system. Vitamin A is concentrated in the skin and mucosal cells that line the airways, digestive tract and urinary tract where pathological organisms first enter your body. Vitamin A serves to support your body's first line of defense against infections. Vitamin A also stimulates production of various types of immune cells, such as white blood cells and T-cells. Vitamin A deficiency is a nutritionally acquired immunodeficiency disease because it increases your risk to many types of infectious diseases, including respiratory disease, measles and gastrointestinal infection. Vitamin A supplementation can reduce the severity and incidence of deaths in people with diarrhea and infectious diseases, such as measles, who are vitamin A deficient, according to the World Health Organization and Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University.
HIV
HIV destroys blood cells called CD4+ T cells, which you need to fight diseases. After becoming infected with HIV, you can develop flu-like symptoms, but many people do not experience symptoms. When untreated early, HIV infection can increase your risk of cancer, cardiovascular disease, and liver and kidney diseases. AIDS occurs during the later stages of HIV infection when your immune system is severely damaged, and too impaired to fight diseases and certain types of cancer. HIV is spread from person-to-person through bodily fluids, such as blood and semen, and from pregnant mother to fetus.
Vitamin A Deficiency and HIV
Vitamin A deficiency increases severity of HIV infection. Declining blood levels of vitamin A are associated with increased progression of HIV to AIDS disease, according to research by scientists at the Tropical Diseases Research Centre in Ndola, Zambia and published in "East African Medical Journal" in September 2001. As the disease progresses you may experience diarrhea, a common symptom of both HIV and vitamin A deficiency. Research by scientists at the University of Gondar in Ethiopia and published in the "Asia Pacific Journal of Clinical Nutrition" in 2007 discovered that blood levels of vitamin A in HIV patients with diarrhea are lower than in healthy persons.
Vitamin A Supplementation
Treating HIV-infected children with vitamin A supplementation can reduce the severity of disease and risk of complications. Research by scientists at Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, Massachusetts and published in the "Journal of Tropical Pediatrics" in February 2010 reports that vitamin A supplementation beginning at 6 months of age is an important intervention for child survival. The scientists discovered higher blood levels of vitamin A in HIV-infected children born to HIV-infected mothers have a lower risk of death than children with lower blood levels of vitamin A.
References
- World Health Organization; Vitamin A Deficiency; 2011
- Centers For Disease Control and Prevention; Basic Information About HIV and AIDS; August 11 2010
- Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University; Vitamin A; Victoria Drake; November 2007
- "East African Medical Journal"; Vitamin A Levels in HIV/AIDS; E,M. Kafwembe, et al.; Sep 2001
- MayoClinic.com; HIV/AIDS; August 11 2010
- "Asia Pacific Journal of Clinical Nutrition"; Vitamin A Deficiency in Patients with Diarrhea and HIV Infection in Ethiopia; Afework Kassu, et al.; 2007
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