dding iodine to salt is a simple manufacturing process does not cost more per person annually. However, if it is not done, children with IDD can grow up stunted, apathetic, mentally retarded and incapable of normal movement, speech or hearing. Even marginal deficiency may reduce a child’s mental development by about 10%. Iodine deficiency disorders (IDD) jeopardize children’s mental health – often their very lives. They start before birth. Serious iodine deficiency during pregnancy may result in stillbirths, abortions and congenital abnormalities such as cretinism, a grave, irreversible form of mental retardation that affects people living in iodine-deficient areas of Asia. However, of far greater global and economic significance is IDD’s less visible, yet more pervasive, level of mental impairment that lowers intellectual prowess at home, at school and at work.

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