An increase in selenium intake improves immune function and poliovirus handling in adults with marginal selenium status123

https://doi.org/10.1093/ajcn/80.1.154 Get rights and content
Under an Elsevier user license
open archive

ABSTRACT

Background

Dietary selenium intakes in many countries, including the United Kingdom, are lower than international recommendations. No functional consequences of these lower intakes have been recognized, although experimental studies suggest that they might contribute to reduced immune function, increased cancer incidence, and increased susceptibility to viral disease.

Objective

The objective was to assess whether administration of small selenium supplements to otherwise healthy UK subjects leads to functional changes in immune status and the rates of clearance and mutation of a picornavirus: live attenuated polio vaccine.

Design

Twenty-two adult UK subjects with relatively low plasma selenium concentrations (<1.2 μmol/L, ≈60% of those screened) received 50 or 100 μg Se (as sodium selenite) or placebo daily for 15 wk in a double-blind study. All subjects received an oral live attenuated poliomyelitis vaccine after 6 wk and enriched stable 74Se intravenously 3 wk later.

Results

Selenium supplementation increased plasma selenium concentrations, the body exchangeable selenium pool (measured by using 74Se), and lymphocyte phospholipid and cytosolic glutathione peroxidase activities. Selenium supplements augmented the cellular immune response through an increased production of interferon γ and other cytokines, an earlier peak T cell proliferation, and an increase in T helper cells. Humoral immune responses were unaffected. Selenium-supplemented subjects also showed more rapid clearance of the poliovirus, and the poliovirus reverse transcriptase–polymerase chain reaction products recovered from the feces of the supplemented subjects contained a lower number of mutations.

Conclusions

The data indicate that these subjects had a functional selenium deficit with suboptimal immune status and a deficit in viral handling. They also suggest that the additional 100 μg Se/d may be insufficient to support optimal function.

Key Words

Selenium supplementation
poliovirus vaccine
immune function
viral mutation

Cited by (0)

1

From the Departments of Medicine (CSB, FM, FA, NML, and MJJ) and Medical Microbiology (CAH), University of Liverpool, United Kingdom, and the Rowett Research Institute, Division of Cell Integrity, Bucksburn, United Kingdom (JAMK and JRA).

2

Supported by the UK Food Standards Agency. JRA's laboratory was funded by the Scottish Executive Environmental and Rural Affairs Department.

3

Address reprint requests to MJ Jackson, Department of Medicine, University of Liverpool, Liverpool L69 3GA, United Kingdom. E-mail: [email protected] .