Vitamin A: Benefits, Deficiency, Toxicity, and More
Vitamin A is an important fat-soluble vitamin that supports your immune system, vision, reproductive health, and fetal growth. Even though it’s essential to get enough, taking too much can be harmful.
Vitamin A plays a vital role in your body. It exists naturally in foods and can also be consumed through supplements.
This article discusses vitamin A, including its benefits, food sources of the vitamin, and the effects of deficiency and toxicity.
Vitamin A is important because it:
makes the immune system work effectively so it can fight disease and infections
keeps our skin healthy
supports reproduction and growth
helps with vision.
Food sources of vitamin A
There are different compounds with vitamin A activity in animal and plant foods. Plant foods can be easy to spot as they tend to have orange/yellow pigment known as beta-carotene.
Plant sources include:
orange and yellow fruit and vegetables – such as carrots, red capsicum, mangoes, sweet potatoes, apricots, pumpkin and cantaloupe
leafy green vegetables – such as spinach, peas and broccoli.
Animal sources include:
liver
eggs
some fortified milk and milk products (with added vitamin A).
Vitamin A deficiency risks
Because of the various roles that vitamin A plays in the body, deficiency can have several health effects. These include:
increased risk of infections
night blindness and irreversible blindness (xeropthalmia)
excessive keratin build-up of the skin.
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