Selenium status of pregnant women and newborns in the former Soviet Union

The estimation of the selenium status during pregnancy is of great importance because of the significance of selenium for fetus growth and antioxidant protection of neonates. This problem is especially urgent for Russia and its neighbors because very little data are available and because data on soil selenium predict low intake levels of selenium. A large epidemiological investigation made in various areas of the former USSR allowed us to obtain the first information concerning the subject. Serum samples were obtained during 1990-1998 from 556 female blood donors aged 20-53 yr and 722 pregnant women (18-33 yr) during different times of gestation. The mean serum selenium concentration of nonpregnant women varied from 0.87 micromol/L (Slavutich, Ukraine) to 1.74 micromol/L (Ioshkar-Ola, Mary-El) and that of women at delivery from 0.66 micromol/L (Zaporozie, Ukraine) to 1.34 micromol/L (Sakhalin, Russia). Compilation of literature and present data on serum selenium showed the following relationships: nonpregnant women versus women at delivery, y = x -0.25, r = 0.94; women at delivery versus umbilical serum, log y = log x -0.2, r = 0.97. The two relationships were used to predict serum selenium values for pregnant women taking into account the progressive serum selenium decrease during advancing pregnancy. In almost half of the towns (i.e. 22-50%), pregnant women were considered to have relative selenium deficiency.