Nutrition and immunity: an overview

Historical accounts and recent epidemiologic studies have suggested a mutually aggravating relationship between malnutrition and infection. In protein-energy malnutrition, there is a significant impairment of several aspects of immunity, including cell-mediated immune responses, secretory immunoglobulin A antibody production, phagocyte function, complement system, antibody affinity and cytokine production. Several micronutrients play a crucial role in maintenance of optimum immune responses. On the other hand, excessive intake of nutrients also impairs immunity. Animals fed diets lacking in nucleotides have lower immune responses than controls but there is no enhancement of immunity when the diet contains large amounts of nucleotides. These observations have considerable practical importance in terms of designing feeding formulas.