Low vitamin C levels in India's elderly population

UP to three quarters of elderly people in parts of India have vitamin C deficiency, a study by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine found.
This study, the first-ever large screening of vitamin C blood levels in the older Indian population, has been published in PloS One. It involved over 5,000 people aged 60 years or over from rural villages and small towns and included interviews about their diet, blood analysis and malnutrition assessments.
The research, funded by the Wellcome Trust, highlights marked differences between the study locations in the north and south of the country, although in both regions the percentages of vitamin C deficient people over 60 years of age were extremely high, with 74% in the north and 46% in the south. Vitamin C levels were also found to vary seasonally, in conjunction with the monsoon months, thought to reflect the lower intake of fruit and vegetables.
The study results highlight that the problem of poor nutrition in the older population has received little attention even though India has one of the fastest growing older populations.Adidas