Population-wide folic acid fortification and preterm birth: Testing the folate depletion hypothesis

A.I. Naimi and N. Auger

American Journal of Public Health, 2015, vol. 105, issue 4, 793-795

Abstract: Objectives. We assess whether population-wide folic acid fortification policies were followed by a reduction of preterm and early-term birth rates in Québec among women with short and optimal interpregnancy intervals. Methods. We extracted birth certificate data for 1.3 million births between 1981 and 2010 to compute age-adjusted preterm and early-term birth rates stratified by short and optimal interpregnancy intervals. We used Joinpoint regression to detect changes in the preterm and early term birth rates and assess whether these changes coincide with the implementation of population-wide folic acid fortification. Results. A change in the pretermbirth rate occurred in 2000 among women with short (95% confidence interval [CI] = 1994, 2005) and optimal (95% CI = 1995, 2008) interpregnancy intervals. Changes in early term birth rates did not coincide with the implementation of folic acid fortification. Conclusions. Our results do not indicate a link between folic acid fortification and early term birth but suggest an improvement in preterm birth rates after implementation of a nationwide folic acid fortification program. © 2015, American Public Health Association Inc. All rights reserved.

Keywords: folic acid, Canada; diet supplementation; human; Premature Birth; statistics and numerical data, Folic Acid; Food, Fortified; Humans; Premature Birth; Quebec (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:aph:ajpbhl:10.2105/ajph.2014.302377_3

DOI: 10.2105/AJPH.2014.302377

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