STRONTIUM IN DIET AND BONE
851
ing to bone deposition. The highest bone levels have been observed in
children since their skeletons tend to follow readily the changes of Sr
in the diet. Evaluation of diet to bone transfer parameters in children
is of importance in predicting the body burdens resulting from different environmental conditions. This evaluation presents several difficulties, including the fact that the diets of infants include specially
processed food items based on milk and Several additives that cannot
be correlated a priori with adult aliments usually surveyed in most fall-
out programs,
This paper summarizes the studies carried out in Argentina on
Sr and stable strontium in the diets and the bones of children. The
work has two aims: (1) the determination of Sr levels in bones of
children whose diet history could be established with reasonable re-
liability and (2) the estimation of representative levels in children’s
aliments, included in the corresponding progress reports.!/?
SAMPLING AND ANALYTICAL PROCEDURES
Five samples per month per brand of special baby foods were sampled at the consumption point. Other food items were sampled in connection with the regular Argentine Comisidn Nacional de Energia
At6mica (CNEA) fallout survey. Samples of each type were pooled
monthly and processed.
Bone
samples were obtained mainly from pediatric hospitals.
These samples were selected to exclude those cases where the causes
of death might have influenced substantially the mineral composition
of bone. Information was obtained from the hospitals on the alimenta-
tion in each case; the family and the intervening practitioner were also
interviewed on the subject.
The samples were processed by the Health and Safety Laboratory
(HASL) using radiochemical procedures’ and counted in low-background
equipment for 99Sr determinations. Natural strontium was determined
by an X-ray fluorescence technique described elsewhere.’
90Sr AND STABLE STRONTIUM IN FOOD
90Sr
Table
1
summarizes the mean results of ‘Sr determinations in
food, excluding milk, in the period 1961-1963. Standard errors of each
entry, which correspond to 10 to 50 samples, are of the order of 5 to
15%. The values shown in Table 1 under the heading “Special Baby
Foods” are representative of the country. The other food levels refer
strictly to the Argentine litoral area and the Buenos Aires Province;