HUNDREDS of babies every year could be spared being born with disabling birth defects if folic acid were routinely added to flour, a specialist committee has concluded.

Many terminations could also be avoided, because folic acid reduces the risk of neural tube defects, such as spina bifida. About 600 pregnancies a year are affected by such defects, with the majority ending in terminations after tests. The toll could be reduced by 41 per cent if every mother had sufficient folic acid in her diet, the Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition has concluded.

It will be up to the Food Standards Agency (FSA) to recommend whether mandatory fortification of flour, already practised in America, Canada and Chile, should be undertaken in Britain. The agency narrowly rejected the recommendation in 2002. This time it is likely to agree to it.

Since the US and Canada introduced fortification in 1998, birth defects have fallen, and there is no evidence of damage to the elderly, which weighed heavily with the FSA three years ago. The fear was that extra folic acid in the diet would conceal the effects of vitamin B12 deficiency in older people. If so, the incidence of serious conditions linked to such deficiencies would rise, offsetting the advantages of reduced birth defects.

In fact, the committee said that the incidence of problems related to B12 deficiency is low and, as long as elderly people are monitored, the risks should not prevent a dietary change that would bring benefits too substantial to ignore, Sheila Bingham, the deputy director of the Dunn Nutrition Unit in Cambridge, who chaired the sub-group responsible for the report, said.

Some foods, such as breakfast cereals, margarines and some breads, are already fortified during manufacture, and some foods, such as liver, yeast extract and green vegetables, contain significant amounts. Women can also take folic acid supplements, but they need to be started before pregnancy. To achieve the greatest advantage, common foods need to be fortified by law, the committee concluded, and the best way to do that would be to fortify flour.

Professor Bingham said that the numbers of neural tube defects had fallen, but that they had shown no decline since the early 1990s. The committee also said that there was no evidence that folic acid could increase cancer risks. A final version of the report will be presented to the FSA, whose board will make the final recommendations.

Andrew Russell, the executive director of the Association for Spina Bifida and Hydrocephalus, said: “This report gives a wonderful opportunity to introduce a measure to benefit all women of child-bearing age and their families. The public should be asking why we have not done this already.”

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