White Privilege and Pregnancy

After reading McIntosh’s article, I did some off-topic research for my research paper about folate consumption, DNA methylation, and other things not relevant to this class…I found out that The National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES II), conducted in 1994, revealed that more black (26%) than white (18%) women had very low folate intakes of about 100 µg/d (which is about 300 µg short of meeting the recommended daily allowance (RDA) if you aren’t pregnant, and about 500 µg shy of meeting of the RDA for pregnancy). The lower average folate intake for minority women was 175-185 µg/d. Potentially, (I think) one of the reasons for this disparity amongst the races is the choice in foods the FDA decided to fortify, which was basically all cereal grains, but mostly breakfast cereal. The NHANES II found that the major food sources of folate in US diets are orange juice (9.7%), white breads (8.61%), dried beans (7.08%), green salads (6.58%), and cold cereals that are not superfortfied (4.96%) for the general population (which, within itself is upsetting…OJ, really?). But when you look at preferences of foods based on ethnicity, you find that the consumption of folic acid–fortified cereals ranked 9th as a source of dietary folate among whites, but ranked 49th among black women. Hmmm....It would make sense for the women who are consuming an insufficient amount of folate to take a folic acid containing supplement (especially because you get more bang for your buck from folic acid rather than folate, as far as how quickly and efficiently its metabolized). Unfortunately, only about a quarter of women (26% whites and 15.5% blacks) regularly take vitamins or mineral supplements. It’s pretty frustrating to pick up on what I would perceive as neglect from our government to take all sorts of food preferences into consideration (not just what the white people like to eat), to make sure that the entire population of women of child-bearing age would have access to foods that would provide them with enough folate to avoid pregnancy troubles such as spontaneous abortions, or neural tube defects.