Vitamin A Nutrition in the Human Foetus: A Comparison of Sweden and Ethiopia

Abstract

The accumulation of vitamin A during fetal development was investigated postmortem in fetuses and newborn infants of well-defined socioeconomic groups of Swedish and Ethiopian women. The median vitamin A concentration in the liver was 37.0 .mu.g/g in the Swedish fetuses (n = 39) and 9.1 .mu.g/g in the Ethiopian ones (n = 49) (P < 0.001). The liver vitamin A concentration in the Swedish fetuses increased exponentially during the 2nd and 3rd trimesters of pregnancy. This trend was not evident in the Ethiopian material. The mean serum concentration of retinol-binding protein was only slightly lower in the healthy Ethiopian newborns (18.6 mg/l; n = 70) than in the Swedish newborns. Vitamin A evidently is retained in the fetal circulation in preference to storage, much like the situation in a vitamin A deficiency state in the adult.