Vegan Diets and FTT

[Guest guest]

>>Vegan diets have been shown to be deficient for pregnant and lactating

mothers. I recall a newspaper story about children being taken away from a

vegan couple because they malnourished them through their dietary practices.

While I am not promoting a vegan diet, I have followed one for over 20 years

(and at 46 can still walk all around a room on my hands and do more pullups and

dips then most people I know) and in two weeks my (beautiful!) daughter turns 22

who, untill the age of 16ish, was raised on a unprocessed whole food vegan diet.

Not only did she not have any health problems as a consequence of her vegan

diet, the opposite was true. School records show that she never missed a day of

school due to illness, and was an highly active and energetic kid. She excelled

in school,and in gymnastics, and in band, playing both the flute and french

horn.

From the way I see it, the problem is that " veganism " in general is not about

health (though some follow it for health reasons), nor does it describe or

automatically imply a healthy diet/lifestyle. All it means, is that the person

following it doesnt comsume (or use, depending on the degree of veganism) any

animal products. A diet of potato chips and pepsi, would be vegan, though

unhealthy.

There can be healthy and unhealthy versions and/or interpretations of almost any

diet regime (including CR-ON and Pritkin both). Consider how many " failure to

thrive " (FTT) babies exist on the typical US diet, yet this doesnt automatically

indite the typical US diet, as many babies not only thrive on it, some seem to

outgrow their britches rather quickly.

There was a recent article about a case in Miami where an infant baby was taken

away from a family due to FTT and whose parents were feeding it a " raw food "

diet. So, several articles appeared in the paper and on the news condemning a

raw food diet. I wrote an editorial to the papers, not to support raw food

diets, but to be fair, because in looking closely at the case, the problem was

not that the foods were " Raw " but the baby was basically being starved and

malrnourished as the parents were trying to raise their very young infant on

basically nothing but limited amounts of carrot juice and some fruit. The baby

should have been being breastfeed (or a comparable substitute) and consuming way

more calories and nutrients than it was. The issue wasnt raw foods, it was

starvation and malnutrition. There are actually about 24 studies published on

the " raw food " diet (and its variations) with about half being somewhat positive

and half being somewhat negative.

Yes, there are cases of children who have been removed from parents who were

feeding the baby a vegan diet and also macrobiotic diets and cases of babies

following both diets who experienced FTT. But in all cases it was due to very

poor dietary panning on the parts of the parents and not the specific limits of

the diet. As we know, and as recent post have discussed, you can practive

CR-ON in an unhealthy way also. This doesnt make CR-ON unhealthy.

However in regard to veganism and children and the latest published data, here

are a few excerpts and thier references...

Vegan Diets in Infants, Children, and Adolescents

Pediatrics in Review. 2004;25:174-176

" Some people believe that patients following vegan or vegetarian diets suffer

from nutritional deficiencies. Although there have been case reports of children

failing to thrive or developing cobalamin deficiency on vegan diets, these are

rare exceptions. Multiple experts have concluded independently that vegan diets

can be followed safely by infants and children without compromise of nutrition

or growth and with some notable health benefits. Pediatricians working with

vegan families must ensure that the parents understand the special nutritional

needs of children at different developmental stages and assist them in meeting

those needs within the framework of their beliefs. "

" There are a few studies of the growth of vegan children. A study of 404 vegan

children in Tennessee ages 4 months to 10 years compared height, weight, and

weight for height with National Center for Health Statistics norms. This

comparison showed small though significant differences in height for age for

children younger than 5 years and significant differences in weight for age in

the 9- and 10-year-old range, with the vegan children weighing 1.11 kg less than

the reference population. A British study of vegan children through age 18 years

showed the vegan population to be within the normal range for height, weight,

head, and chest circumference compared with population standards. In this study,

vegan boys tended to be slightly lighter and shorter (below the 50th percentile

for nonvegan boys), and girls tended to be slightly lighter. Despite these

growth differences, no evidence of growth failure in the vegan population

(weight for age below the 3rd or 5th percentile) was seen in either of these

studies. Indeed, smaller size may be associated with better long-term health, as

has been demonstrated in animal studies. "

Adolescent Vegetarians: How Well Do Their Dietary Patterns Meet the Healthy

People 2010 Objectives? CL, McGuire MT, Neumark-Sztainer D, Story M. Arch

Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2002;156:431-437

Considerations in Planning Vegan Diets: Infants. Mangels AR, Messina V. J Am

Diet Assoc. 2001;101:670-677

Considerations in Planning Vegan Diets: Children. Messina V, Mangels AR. J Am

Diet Assoc. 2001;101:661-669

Vegetarian Diets and Children. TAB. Pediatr Clin North Am.

1995;42:955-965

Regard

jeff