| Toxicity: |
A water soluble vitamin
required in the diet of mammals. Sulfonamide drugs are selectively
toxic to bacteria because they inhibit the incorporation
of p-aminobenzoic acid into folic acid, a biosynthetic process
in bacteria. Folic acid deficiency adversely affects prenatal
development in humans. Dietary supplementation with folic
acid dramatically reduces the incidence of neural tube defects
in humans. Folic acid deficiency may also contribute to the causes of megaloblastic macrocytic anemia and a consequence
of this is that this disease can be induced, as a side effect,
when methotrexate, a folic acid antagonist, is used in cancer
chemotherapy |