Diet deficient in calcium affect the human body’s functions of bone formation and maintenance, transmission of nerve impulses, muscular contraction, and abilities for blood coagulation.
The symptoms of calcium deficiency includes rickets, osteomalacia, osteoporosis, scurvy, tetany, parathyroid hyperplasia, stunted growth, laryngospasm.
One of the first signs of a deficiency is a nervous affliction called tetany, which is characterized by muscle cramps, numbness and tingling in the arms and legs.
While ‘rickets’ is a condition when bone is malformation due to a softening of the bones.
Other symptoms include: curvature of the spine and ribs, loss appetite, and lameness. In the case of more prolonged deficit of calcium, ‘leaching’ of this element from the bones causes increased absorption of lead from polluted environments and its incorporations into bones and teeth.
Deficiency of calcium lowers the body resistance and for the children become as easy prey to respiratory and intestinal infections.
Calcium deficiency
