Eggs for Gut Health

Undernutrition in children manifests as wasting, stunting, or both. While wasting is generally responsive to high-quality nutritional interventions, stunting is less so. Affected children are at increased risk of acute and chronic illnesses, have reduced neurocognitive development, lower academic achievement, reduced adult earning potential, and shortened lifespans. Given that stunting affects over 140 million children at any one time, the costs incurred are deep and broad, particularly among children in sub-Saharan Africa, where nearly half of the world's population growth is expected to occur over the next 30 years. Part of the challenge of treating stunting has been attributed to environmental enteric dysfunction (EED), an acquired small intestine disorder characterized by chronic inflammation, villus blunting, and impaired nutrient absorption. EED is prevalent in the same populations plagued by stunting, develops concurrently with loss in linear growth, and has explained upwards of 43% of observed growth faltering. EED has recently also been found in over 75% of children with moderate acute malnutrition (MAM, moderate wasting) in Sierra Leone, a population with high rates of deterioration to severe acute malnutrition and death, 20%. EED is a plausible cause for this treatment resistance, and for the high rates of recurrence seen in these children. There is an urgent need to increase understanding of the concurrence of stunting, EED, and wasting, and to test interventions targeted to their pathological underpinnings. Dietary egg can play a critical role in the fight against malnutrition by providing abundant high-quality protein and nutrients essential for physical and cognitive recovery. One egg/day has been shown to reduce stunting in several contexts. Recent evidence has shown that short-term egg/bovine colostrum supplement given to 9-12-month-old Malawian children improved linear growth and intestinal permeability in children with severe EED. It is possible that prolonged supplementation with egg in a high-risk population in rural Sierra Leone could improve acute and long-term health trajectories for children and put eggs on the map for food aid. This will be a randomized, investigator-blinded, controlled clinical trial testing whether daily supplementation with 15g whole egg powder during and for 18 weeks after treatment for moderate acute malnutrition might reduce intestinal permeability and improve linear growth, among other outcomes, when compared with control corn powder. Children with relatively higher risk MAM will be enrolled (MUAC < 12.5 cm AND MUACz < -2), treated with Supercereal Plus for up to 6 weeks, and undergo urine and stool collections at 6, 12, and 24 weeks. Urine collections will be for assessment of lactulose permeability and will involve participant consumption of a known amount of lactulose and collection of all urine over at least 4 hours thereafter. Stool collections will be for fecal host mRNA transcripts and selected proteins. Participants will also receive intermittent malaria chemoprophylaxis.