Can Vitamin E, taken during pregnancy protect your child from asthma?

Scientists believe that pregnant women could stop their children from developing asthma by taking the simple action of eating foods that are vitamin E rich.

They believe a study that discovered that children, whose mothers had a low vitamin E intake during pregnancy, were over five times more likely to develop 'asthma', by the age of five years.

It was also reported that such children are also more likely to be wheezy and chesty, even when they hadn't a cold. the British team has suggested, in previous research that the higher the mother's intake of foods which where rich in vitamin E, during her pregnancy, the corresponding lower the risk of the child's immune system being sensitive to allergens in the form of dust mites and pollens, and other allergens.

These important findings have implications for the unexplained alarmingly increased rates of asthma in Britain, which are among the highest found in Europe. More than a million British children suffer from asthma, and the worrying thing is that these rates have increased by something like four times, since the 1970s. Asthma treatment to youngsters costs over £53million a year to treat in the younger than five year olds. The majority of this cost is down to GP, and prescription drug cost.

Aberdeen University Scientists however urged women to treat their findings with some caution. They say that more research is needed before fully specified advice on the amount of vitamin E that should be given to pregnant women.

The scientists advise that Vitamin E, is found in such foods as vegetable oils, margarine, meat, nuts, fish and leafy green vegetables, especially broccoli.

The EU recommended daily intake amount is 10mg although the recommended upper level is considered to be 540mg a day.

Recent research into the benefits of vitamin E supplements, has been inconclusive and sometimes conflicting. Earlier studies had suggested that Vitamin E, had a protective effect against miscarriage and pre-eclampsia. Especially this is taken together with high doses of vitamin C.

But in two recent studies it was found that the reverse may actually be true.

Other trials have actually linked vitamin E supplements to the risk of having a stillbirth. Women have been advised to avoid some sources of vitamin E, such as nuts, because they also contain high levels of fat.

The latest study was published in the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, following more than 1,250 mothers and children over a 5 year period.

Dr Graham Devereux, of the Department of Environmental and Occupational Medicine, said that vitamin E appeared to affect the developing airways and lung function of the foetus. It also affected the way a the baby's immune system responded to allergens. He said: 'children born to mothers who were found to have a low vitamin E intake during pregnancy were some five times more likely to be asthmatic than children whose mothers had eaten a high in vitamin E diet. 'The importance of this study is that it may, in future be possible to reduce this increasing risk of asthma in children simply by changing the diet of mothers during their pregnancy. They warn however, that there must be further work carried out before actually specific advice can be given to pregnant mothers.' During the study mothers were placed into five categories based upon their vitamin E intake.

Then children born to the women in the upper and the lower sections of vitamin E consumption were compared. Those in the lower section of the group were found to have had more than a fivefold higher risk of indicating early asthma symptoms by the time they reached the age of 5 years.

There was some earlier previous research which has suggested babies who are given 'antibiotics', were found to have a higher risk of developing 'childhood asthma'.

Following further information from a study by scientists at the University of British Columbia in Canada this year, it was found that infants under one year old who were treated with an antibiotic, were twice as likely, as untreated children to have the childhood asthma condition.