Beware of vegan diets for newborn babies

Beware of vegan diets for newborn babies

News of children sent to hospital with severe forms of malnutrition due to a vegan diet imposed by their parents has begun to multiply. The vegan ideology, and its most uncompromising version (fruitarian), is affecting more and more people, usually from highly educated groups. These food choices may be understandable, even if not justifiable, for adults, but forcing children to adopt a diet lacking in animal-derived products may expose them to severe risks for their health and psycho-physical development.

We are talking about ideology because, after being weaned, herbivores in nature are anatomically and physiologically equipped to digest vegetable fibers and proteins with the help of bacteria and protozoans that produce both proteins having a high biological value, like those contained in meat as well as the especially indispensable B-group vitamins. Being omnivores that developed in a food niche where meat had a fundamental role (we were hunter-gatherers for millions of years), humans cannot synthesize these essential nutrients. Thus if they eat only vegetables, they must use artificial food supplements whose efficacy in terms of nutrient bioavailability cannot be compared to that of foods.
Moreover, this forcing, also psychological, that makes children dependent on the food supplement industry from a very young age is evident.
Therefore, if you decide to follow a vegetarian or vegan diet, a greater commitment in the food options is required. The diet requires larger quantities of food (which is not always possible) to enable the adequate intake of all nutrients and it must be balanced from an energy point of view to guarantee the body enough energy for metabolism and muscular activity…
The Monet family in their garden at Argenteuil - Edouard Manet
The Monet family in their garden at Argenteuil – Edouard Manet
Autore : Giuseppe Pulina e Marcello Mele, Georgofili World

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