If you are pregnant or looking to stay, you will surely know what folic acid is and you will be taking a supplement. This video is an interesting review about the use of folic acid during pregnancy for the prevention of congenital malformations of the neural tube.
We have seen it on several occasions: folic acid is an indispensable aid during pregnancy, since it has been proven that it prevents problems that may arise in the brain or spinal cord.
This fact has been related for more than 30 years, and since then a successful health policy is being carried out in many countries, which has proven beneficial for the collective health of their populations.
The video provides a summary of the main research that demonstrates evidence of the effectiveness of folic acid, a very recent one (2010) that talks about the reduction of neonatal mortality due to alterations of the neural tube.
It also offers a study on fortification or enrichment with folic acid in industrial food products (something that we see increasingly in our environment), which indicates the null effectiveness of this measure in communities without resources.
However, for the general population, the wheat flour fortification plan has proven effective in different countries around the world, with a decrease in neonatal deaths due to defects caused by folic acid deficiency.
A highly recommended video that also reviews the history of the discovery of the importance of folic acid during pregnancy and its subsequent acceptance by the scientific community and extension to the whole society, until reaching the present time.
