[ČLANAK POVUČEN/ARTICLE RETRACTED] Today, human iodine deficiency is next to iron the most common nutritional deficiency in developed European and underdeveloped third world countries, respectively. A current biological indicator of iodine status is urinary iodine that reflects the very recent iodine exposure, whereas some long term indicator of iodine status remains to be identified. We analyzed hair iodine in a prospective, observational, cross-sectional, and exploratory study involving 870 apparently healthy Croatians (270 men and 600 women). Hair iodine was analyzed with the inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry (ICP MS). Population (n870) hair iodine (IH) respective median was 0.499μgg(-1) (0.482 and 0.508μgg(-1)) for men and women, respectively, suggesting no sex related difference. We studied the hair iodine uptake by the logistic sigmoid saturation curve of the median derivatives to assess iodine deficiency, adequacy and excess. We estimated the overt iodine deficiency to occur when hair iodine concentration is below 0.15μgg(-1). Then there was a saturation range interval of about 0.15-2.0μgg(-1) (r(2)=0.994). Eventually, the sigmoid curve became saturated at about 2.0μgg(-1) and upward, suggesting excessive iodine exposure. Hair appears to be a valuable and robust long term biological indicator tissue for assessing the iodine body status. We propose adequate iodine status to correspond with the hair iodine (IH) uptake saturation of 0.565-0.739μgg(-1) (55-65%).