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Discretionary Fortification—A Public Health Perspective

‘Discretionary fortification’ refers to the addition of vitamins and minerals to foods at the discretion of manufacturers for marketing purposes, but not as part of a planned public health intervention. While the nutrients added may correspond to needs in the population, an examination of novel beve...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autor principal: Valerie, Tarasuk
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2014
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4210926/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25329969
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu6104421
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author Valerie, Tarasuk
author_facet Valerie, Tarasuk
author_sort Valerie, Tarasuk
collection PubMed
description ‘Discretionary fortification’ refers to the addition of vitamins and minerals to foods at the discretion of manufacturers for marketing purposes, but not as part of a planned public health intervention. While the nutrients added may correspond to needs in the population, an examination of novel beverages sold in Toronto supermarkets revealed added nutrients for which there is little or no evidence of inadequacy in the population. This is consistent with the variable effects of manufacturer-driven fortification on nutrient adequacy observed in the US. Nutrient intakes in excess of Tolerable Upper Intake Levels are now observed in the context of supplement use and high levels of consumption of fortified foods. Expanding discretionary fortification can only increase nutrient exposures, but any health risks associated with chronically high nutrient loads from fortification and supplementation remain to be discovered. Regulatory bodies are focused on the establishment of safe levels of nutrient addition, but their estimation procedures are fraught with untested assumptions and data limitations. The task of determining the benefits of discretionary fortification is being left to consumers, but the nutrition information available to them is insufficient to allow for differentiation of potentially beneficial fortification from gratuitous nutrient additions.
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spelling pubmed-42109262014-10-28 Discretionary Fortification—A Public Health Perspective Valerie, Tarasuk Nutrients Review ‘Discretionary fortification’ refers to the addition of vitamins and minerals to foods at the discretion of manufacturers for marketing purposes, but not as part of a planned public health intervention. While the nutrients added may correspond to needs in the population, an examination of novel beverages sold in Toronto supermarkets revealed added nutrients for which there is little or no evidence of inadequacy in the population. This is consistent with the variable effects of manufacturer-driven fortification on nutrient adequacy observed in the US. Nutrient intakes in excess of Tolerable Upper Intake Levels are now observed in the context of supplement use and high levels of consumption of fortified foods. Expanding discretionary fortification can only increase nutrient exposures, but any health risks associated with chronically high nutrient loads from fortification and supplementation remain to be discovered. Regulatory bodies are focused on the establishment of safe levels of nutrient addition, but their estimation procedures are fraught with untested assumptions and data limitations. The task of determining the benefits of discretionary fortification is being left to consumers, but the nutrition information available to them is insufficient to allow for differentiation of potentially beneficial fortification from gratuitous nutrient additions. MDPI 2014-10-17 /pmc/articles/PMC4210926/ /pubmed/25329969 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu6104421 Text en © 2014 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Review
Valerie, Tarasuk
Discretionary Fortification—A Public Health Perspective
title Discretionary Fortification—A Public Health Perspective
title_full Discretionary Fortification—A Public Health Perspective
title_fullStr Discretionary Fortification—A Public Health Perspective
title_full_unstemmed Discretionary Fortification—A Public Health Perspective
title_short Discretionary Fortification—A Public Health Perspective
title_sort discretionary fortification—a public health perspective
topic Review
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4210926/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25329969
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/nu6104421
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