University of Otago-led research has discovered seasonal vitamin D deficiency in industrial-era Britain, suggesting that factors other than indoor work and pollution contributed to historic rickets, and suggests that current vitamin D deficiency It emphasizes the importance of understanding past health problems to help with management.
A University of Otago-led study has found that rickets, which was widespread among children during the Industrial Revolution, was not solely caused by factory work and urban pollution, which were thought to be the main causes of vitamin D deficiency at the time. found.
Research funded by Marsden and just recently published pro swanResearchers from the Universities of Otago, Durham, Edinburgh, Brighton and the University of Queensland collected teeth from industrial-era British cemeteries and looked for microscopic markers of nutritional disease.
Lead author Dr Annie Solar-Snoddy, a research fellow at the Otago Department of Anatomy, said they had discovered some of the first clear evidence of seasonal vitamin D deficiency in archaeological samples.
She said it has long been known that rickets, a childhood bone disease caused by vitamin D deficiency, increased in 2018.th and 19th century Europe.
“This is thought to be because more people, including children, are working longer hours indoors and living in crowded housing and smog-filled environments. The amount of sunlight reaching the skin is reduced, which is how humans make vitamin D. ”
New insights from bioarchaeological methods
But new bioarchaeological techniques have allowed researchers to go beyond just looking at bone deformities to get a clearer picture of how vitamin D deficiency affects people living in industrial England. was completed.
The study found markers associated with vitamin D deficiency inside 76 percent of the teeth analyzed. In many samples, these occurred regularly, on a yearly basis.
“This shows clear evidence of seasonal vitamin D deficiency in the teeth of people living in the north of England.
“This is interesting because it highlights that latitude and seasonal lack of sunlight are major factors in the amount of vitamin D that these people can produce in their skin. It is more complex than factors associated with the industrial revolution, such as the increase in Solar-Snoddy explains.
The continuing challenge of vitamin D deficiency
Poor vitamin D status is associated with several negative health outcomes, including increased risk of infections. cardiovascular diseaseand cancer.
Vitamin D deficiency is an ongoing problem in society, and Dr. Solar-Snoddy believes it is important to study what happened in the past to inform modern approaches to this disease. .
“We tend to think of archaeological human bones as being from another world, but our biology hasn’t changed in the past 200 years.
“Teeth are a very important source of information for archaeologists. Teeth form in a very precise chronological order and, importantly, tooth tissue does not change throughout the lifespan. This locks in the record of human growth and This means it remains until death or the tooth is lost.
“Understanding how and why vitamin D deficiency affected people in the past provides important detailed perspective on this disease,” she says.
Reference: ‘The status of vitamin D in northern England since the Middle Ages: Insights from tooth histology and enamel peptide analysis at Coach Lane, North Shields (AD 1711-1857)’ Anne-Marie E. Snoddy, Heidi Shaw, Sophie Newman, Justina J. Miskiewicz, Nicholas A. Stewart, Tina Jacob, Harry Buckley, Anwen Kafell, Rebecca Gowland, January 31, 2024. pro swan.
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0296203
