By Chrystal Johnson, public health educator II

Healthy Communities

(Wampsville, NY – Jan. 2015) Jan. 4 through 10 is Folic Acid Awareness Week, but folic acid should be a part of a healthy lifestyle every day of the week. You can start the New Year off right by taking a multivitaminwith 400 mcg of the B-vitamin folic acid every day. Your body uses folic acid every day to stay healthy.

Think you are getting all of the vitamins you need from your diet alone? Think again. Most people do not know that it is hard to get certain vitamins from food alone. Many believe they donot need to take multivitamins because they eat healthy foods. Multivitamins help fill in thosenutrition gaps in the diet, especially when it comes to getting enough folic acid.

Folic acid is the synthetic form of the naturally occurring folate in foods. Folate is found infoods such as leafy green vegetables, beans, liver and some fruit. The synthetic version, folicacid, is found in multivitamins and fortified foods like breakfast cereal, pasta and bread. Folic acid is easier for your body to absorb than folate, plus 50 to 90 percent of food folate is destroyedin cooking.

Folic acid is an essential B-vitamin; therefore, everyone needs it in order to stay in good health. Folic acid helps build DNA and your body uses it for cell growth and reproduction,fundamental building block processing and genetic material production.

In 1998, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration started fortifying grain and cereal productswith folic acid in order to reduce neural tube defects (NTDs). While this was a great step in thefight to prevent birth defects, it is not enough to protect all women and their potential children.The most common NTDs are spina bifida and anencephaly.

Folic acid is water soluble; therefore it passes through your body very quickly. Taking folicacid every day ensures that you always have it in your system when your body needs it. Allwomen especially those ages 14-49 years, also known as the childbearing years, it is particularly important to consume 400 mcg of folic aciddaily. It has been shown to reduce the risk of NTDs in developing babies by up to 70 percent.Since 50 percent of pregnancies are unplanned, it’s important to take folic acid every day, even if you’re not planning to get pregnant.

Everyone needs folic acid every day, especially all women. Taking folic acid every day, beforea pregnancy begins, is an important way to reduce neural tube defects (NTDs). These birth defectsoccur in the first weeks of fetal development, often before a woman even knows she is pregnant.

There are other valuable benefits to getting enough folic acid. It helps your body make healthy new cells, which means healthier skin, hair and nails.Folic acid may also help protect you from having a strokeand help lower your chances of getting heart disease and some types of cancers.

For more information on how to prevent birth defects, visit www.healthymadisoncounty.org and click on Health Information.