Professor and chair of the Bloomberg School's Department of International Health Robert Black, MD and colleagues reported the findings of a randomized, double-blind trial conducted among 42,546 children in Pemba, Zanzibar, an area where malaria is prevalent. Half of the children were given a 10 milligram daily zinc supplement, and the remainder received a placebo.
While supplementing with zinc reduced overall deaths by 7 percent, children between the ages of 1 and 4 experienced an 18 percent reduction in mortality. Zinc did not appear to affect children younger than the age of 12 months. "This large trial demonstrates that the benefits of zinc supplementation include mortality reduction in addition to the reduction in cases of pneumonia, diarrhea and malaria that we found in previous trials," Dr Black concluded.
The study's finding that zinc supplements did not appear to benefit infants less than 12 months old could be due to the children having acquired sufficient amounts of the mineral in utero and from breastfeeding to meet their requirements during the first year of life. Additionally, it is significant that this group was only provided with half the dose of zinc that the older children in the study received.
"While further work is needed
Dayna Dye writes for Life Extension - a global authority on health, wellness and nutrition as well as a provider of scientific information on anti-aging therapies and nutritional supplements, including minerals, herbs, hormones and vitamins.
