Health Report.Many people have low ironin their blood.But pregnant women need extra ironfor their own healthand their baby's health.Iron is important to the developmentof a baby's brainand central nervous system.In poor countries, however,providing all pregnant womenwith iron supplementscan be a financial issue.Some experts saygiving supplements to babiesafter they are born is enough.Someone who disagreesis Parul Christian, a nutritionistat the Johns Hopkins Schoolof Public Health in Maryland.She and other scientistshave been doing research in Nepal.She says their latest findingsshould settle any questionabout the value of making sureevery pregnant womanreceives iron supplements.Iron is a micronutrient.Micronutrients are importantsubstances that are foundin small amounts in foods.The researchers firstcompleted a study among poor womenin Nepal ten years ago.During pregnancy some of the womenreceived supplements containingiron and another micronutrient,folic acid.Professor Christian saysthat study showed the supplementscould improve child survival.Now the children are older.The researchers returnedto Nepal and testedtheir neurological development.They found improved intellectualand fine motor abilitiesamong those whose mothershad received iron and folic acidduring pregnancy andfor three months after.The findings appear in the Journalof the American Medical Association.Another new study, publishedin the journal Pediatrics,looks at levels of vitamin D in babies.It says newborns with the lowest levelswere twice as likely to developrespiratory infections as thosewith normal levels of vitamin D.Vitamin D helps build strong bonesand strengthens the body's defensesagainst disease.The vitamin is commonly addedto cow's milk and alsofound in supplements.But vitamin D is calledthe sunshine vitamin.The body naturally produces itfrom sunlight.Carlos Camargo from HarvardMedical School in Massachusettsand other researchers did the study.It followed more than nine hundredchildren in New Zealanduntil they were five years old.CARLOS CAMARGO: "And what we foundwas that children who hadthe lowest levels of vitamin Dhad a high risk of developing infectionsand wheezing throughout childhood."He says the problem of vitamin D deficiency is not limitedto countries with the least sun.CARLOS CAMARGO: "People are movingmore and more indoors.And they work indoors.They play indoors.Everything's indoors.And so we're actually startingto see low levels of vitamin Din areas where the sun is plentiful."And that's the VOA Special EnglishHealth Report.