Bread target for iodine dose

A transtasman health regulator is considering making iodine a compulsory ingredient in all bread sold in New Zealand and Australia.

Food Standards Australia New Zealand is investigating the idea as a way to improve public health.

Spokeswoman Lydia Buchtmann said New Zealand research had identified an increasingly widespread mild deficiency in the essential nutrient.

The researchers suggested compulsorily dosing New Zealanders with iodine in their daily bread or their milk - instead of their salt - to stave off the return of a goitre epidemic.

A lack of iodine in the diet is associated with iodine deficiency disorders which can cause goitre - a malfunction of the thyroid gland - intellectual impairment, vision and hearing problems and infertility.

Low-iodine diets can retard children's mental and physical development and make people tired, overweight and constipated.

Seafood, eggs, meat and cereals contain iodine, but food grown in soils with low iodine content are poor sources of it.
"As locally produced food is naturally low in iodine, it is difficult to meet dietary requirements through the diet," Ms Buchtmann said.

Otago University professor of nutrition Christine Thomson said late last year that research indicated New Zealanders' iodine levels had dropped below internationally recommended levels and more people had goitre, indicating mild iodine deficiency.

Professor Thomson said goitre was a widespread problem until iodine was added to salt in the early 1930s.

In recent years, health-conscious people had started using less salt or were buying food that did not contain iodised salt.

"The use of iodised salt by consumers and food manufacturers does not appear to be having the desired effect on iodine intake," Ms Buchtmann said.

Food Standards Australia New Zealand is seeking public comment on mandatory iodine fortification of foods such as bread.

Food chosen for fortification would need to be regularly consumed in stable, predictable amounts, be cheap and store well, it said.

Health ministers on both sides of the Tasman agreed in May with their food standards officials to give priority to the compulsory addition of iodine and folate to some foods.

The Australia and New Zealand Food Regulation Ministerial Council backed mandatory fortification of food with folate and iodine after severe brain and spinal birth defects in babies dropped 27 per cent in the United States from 1998, when authorities began requiring makers of cereal, pasta, bread and flour to fortify their foods with folic acid.

The effect of similar changes in Newfoundland and Labrador in Canada has been nearly three times greater.

The issue has also been raised by Australian company Wyeth Australia, which wants to boost the amount of iodine it puts in foods for toddlers.

Wyeth wants permission to double the 35 micrograms of iodine allowed in foods for children aged 1 to 3.

Food Standards' general manager in Wellington, Dean Stockwell, has said public submissions have also been sought on plans by another company to use iodine instead of chlorine to disinfect fruit, vegetables, nuts and eggs.

The agency had concluded that the use of iodine as a washing agent was technologically justified, even though it might result in a small increase in iodine intake.

Some bakers have raised cost and technical issues for the industry over flour fortification.

They say buying nutrients, new equipment, further testing and quality control, and marketing would add to costs.

THE PROBLEM

Iodine is an essential nutrient in food.

Lack of iodine causes health problems such as enlarged thyroid gland (goitre), and is especially dangerous for pregnant women.

Iodine intake has dropped, especially as people use less iodised salt.

Health regulators in New Zealand and Australia have been debating whether iodine should be added to bread or milk.

- AAP