Shedding Light on Vitamin D Status and Its Complexities during Pregnancy, Infancy and Childhood: An Australian Perspective

Abstract

Ensuring that the entire Australian population is Vitamin D sufficient is challenging, given the wide range of latitudes spanned by the country, its multicultural population and highly urbanised lifestyle of the majority of its population. Specific issues related to the unique aspects of vitamin D metabolism during pregnancy and infancy further complicate how best to develop a universally safe and effective public health policy to ensure vitamin D adequacy for all. Furthermore, as Australia is considered a "sunny country", it does not yet have a national vitamin D food supplementation policy. Rickets remains very uncommon in Australian infants and children, however it has been recognised for..