Pregnancy W/ Calcium Deficiency Release Lead Faster From Bones
There are two things to consider here. First, it brings to light the fact that lead exposure is high enough in the population to lead to its storage in bones. Next, calcium supplementation is very important in pregnant women who do not consume enough calcium-rich foods.
(article) Pregnant women who don’t consume enough calcium in their diets or through supplements show greater increases in lead in their bloodstreams than pregnant women with normal calcium levels, according to a new University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill study.Bone tissue contains 95% of the body’s lead. In pregnant women who get less calcium, the bone tissue turns over, or “demineralizes,” more rapidly than bone in other pregnant women and releases locked-up lead into the blood, researchers found.Lead emerges from bone during the second half of pregnancy and might hurt both mothers and their babies, their work showed. The study, which was published in the November issue of the Journal of Epidemiology, also offers new evidence that calcium consumption can minimize bone demineralization in pregnant women.