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EFFECTS
Deficiency Diseases, disorders caused by lack of specific essential substances such as vitamins, minerals, or amino acids. More broadly, the term applies to conditions in which the essential substances are present but not absorbed, or in which the organism fails to produce a natural and essential substance. Such diseases as beriberi, scurvy, pellagra, and rickets are caused by lack of particular vitamins, and recovery is dramatically prompt when adequate quantities of the vitamins are supplied in the diet. Certain types of anemia may be caused by a dietary lack of iron in usable form. At least ten amino acids, ten minerals, and ten vitamins are indispensable nutritional elements in the human diet, and the absence of any one causes a specific deficiency disease.
Deficiency diseases are usually associated with lack of vitamins or minerals. The effects of a vitamin or mineral deficiency on the body depend on the function of the particular nutrient lacking. For example, vitamin A is important for good vision, and severe deficiency of this vitamin may cause blindness. Because some vitamins and minerals have many functions, prolonged nutritional deficiencies can therefore have wide-ranging effects on health.
Diets that lack a wide variety of foods may result in vitamin deficiency diseases...