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Orange sweet potato reduces diarrhea in children
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Promoting orange sweet potatoes reduced the prevalence and duration of diarrhea in young children in Mozambique, according to recent study data.
Researchers aimed to evaluate the impact on child health of the 2007-2009 HarvestPlus Reaching End Users program, a successful targeted biofortification intervention for improving vitamin A intakes in young children in northern Mozambique by promoting the cultivation of orange sweet potatoes in home gardens.
“The beta-carotene in [orange sweet potato] is converted into vitamin A the same day the [orange sweet potato] is eaten,” Erick Boy, MSc, PhD, head of nutrition at HarvestPlus, said in a press release. “This vitamin A is used by the cells lining the gut to help form a barrier to invading germs. These cells are regenerated every few days, so cells that have been weakened due to lack of vitamin A are quickly replaced by healthy cells when there is enough vitamin A. It should be noted that access to clean water and sanitation, targeted immunization and breastfeeding are also important in helping to prevent diarrhea.”
Boy and colleagues performed a cluster-randomized impact evaluation of a sample of 1,321 observations of children under age 5 from 36 villages (1/3 controls), and the primary outcome indicators were prevalence and duration of diarrhea within 2 weeks before being interviewed. Orange sweet potato consumption was measured by a food frequency questionnaire.
They found the biofortification intervention reduced the prevalence of diarrhea by 11.4% (95% CI, 2-20.8) in children aged less than 5 years and by 18.9% (95% CI, 6.6-68.3) in children aged less than 3 years. It also reduced diarrhea duration.
“Both vitamin A supplements and vitamin A-rich foods like orange sweet potato can provide sufficient vitamin A. From a public health perspective, they are complementary — neither alone is able to reach every child who needs vitamin A,” Alan de Brauw, PhD, senior research fellow at the International Food Policy Research Institute, said in the press release. “But vitamin A supplements can be expensive, as much as $2.71 per dose. Alleviating this deficiency worldwide through supplements alone would cost almost $3 billion per year. Using [orange sweet potato] to provide vitamin A is a fraction of that cost. Given the popularity of [orange sweet potato] — children especially love its taste — we think it's a sustainable solution to improving nutrition and child health in many countries, complemented, of course, by supplementation where it is cost-effective.” – by Adam Leitenberger
Disclosure: The researchers report no relevant financial disclosures.
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