Palliative Effects of Vitamins C and E on Blood Parameters of Growing Rabbits Fed Crude Oil-Contaminated Diets

Abstract

The palliative effects of vitamins C and E in rabbits that ingested crude oil were investigated on the animals’ blood parameters. 24 males New Zealand White rabbits weighing between 770-835 grams were acquired for the study from one source in one batch and randomly allocated to three dietary treatments of 8 rabbits per treatment. The animals had similar diet and management conditions for 2 weeks to properly pre-condition them for the study after which they were presented with their experimental diets as: T₀ (was the negative control group; no crude oil and experimental vitamins C and E), T₁ received crude oil at 1.5g or 0.15% /kg of diet while the T₂ group also received dietary crude as in T₁ but in addition received 200mg (100mg of vitamin C + 100mg of vitamin E)/kg of diet, respectively for 2 weeks. The hemoglobin (Hb) concentrations of the T₀ animals were significantly higher (P < 0.05) than those of T₁ and T₂ animals. However, those of T₂ animals were significantly higher (P < 0.05) than those of T₁ animals. This trend was mirrored in the packed cell volume (PCV), red blood cell (RBC) counts and white blood cell (WBC) counts, respectively. It was concluded that ingestion of crude oil induced anemia and leukemia in rabbits. However, the intake of vitamins C and E had some palliative attributes in reducing the degrees of anemia and leukemia induced by crude oil ingestion in the rabbit.