Maintenance on acidified drinking water rescues anemia in sublytic mice.Sublytic homozygous mice 2-4 months of age (n = 4) were maintained for a period of 3 months on drinking water acidified to pH 2.5-2.8 with hydrochloric acid. C57BL/6J mice (n = 6) were maintained for the same period on normal drinking water. Data shown are from analysis after 3 months of treatment. (A) Complete blood counts. *P < .05 by Student t test. (B) Section of spleen from sublytic homozygote stained for iron with Prussian blue and shown at a 20× magnification. (C) Serum iron levels and (D) Hamp expression measured by quantitative RT-PCR using total RNA isolated from liver. Expression was normalized to that of endogenous 18S transcripts. P = .0571 by Student t test.