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Posted on 01/30/2003 4:42:10 PM PST by KQQL
Neurological problems were traced to lack of vitamin B12, new report says.
THURSDAY, Jan. 30 (HealthScoutNews) -- Vegetarian women who breast-feed may be putting their babies at risk for neurological problems.
U.S. health officials are reporting that two children in Georgia who were experiencing various neurological problems, including speech and motor delays, were diagnosed with vitamin B12 deficiency last year.
The officials are blaming it on the mothers, both of whom breast-fed their children and both of whom were vegetarians.
The cases, which appear to be part of an upward trend, are detailed in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report for Jan. 31.
"The clinicians we worked with are concerned. They're seeing it more often," says Maria Elena Jefferds, Epidemic Intelligence Service officer with the CDC's National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion.
Vitamin B12, or cobalamin, helps maintain healthy nerve cells and red blood cells and also is involved in making DNA. It is found primarily in animal products such as fish, meat, dairy products and eggs, putting vegetarians at a heightened risk for deficiency, the report says.
Pregnant women, along with women who are lactating, need to be especially vigilant. According to the CDC, the most common cause of cobalamin deficiency in infants and young children is a mother who lacks this essential nutrient.
While the damage may be reversible, that may not always be the case.
The first child discussed in the CDC report was a girl hospitalized in August 2001 for lethargy and "failure to thrive." She was 15 months old at the time. Her mother, who had been a vegan for the preceding seven years, had breast-fed her daughter for eight months. Although the mother reported taking nutritional and vitamin supplements, it wasn't clear how much cobalamin they contained.
The girl, now 31 months old and on cobalamin supplements, is improving. At 28 months, her fine motor skills were appropriate for a nine-month-old, her gross motor skills were at 18 months and her expressive language was at 10 months.
The second case involved a boy who, at 30 months, was hospitalized with a diagnosis of "failure to thrive," as well as poor motor and speech development. He had been breast-fed exclusively for the first nine months of his life by a mother who had been a vegetarian for 20 years.
After receiving cobalamin supplements every other day, he, too, is playing catch-up to his peers. About six months after beginning treatment, the 4-year-old still had delays in speech and motor skills, but his gross motor skills were appropriate for his age, the CDC says.
"It looks like both children have bounced back pretty well," Jefferds says. "Their impairments will be resolved through time, but it's hard to know when you have this kind of impairment. You just have to see what happens as they get older."
The message here is simple: Vegetarians, especially ones who are pregnant or lactating, need to take a cobalamin supplement or eat fortified foods. Lactating women, even more than pregnant women, are at risk for cobalamin deficiency, Jefferds says.
"You can live a perfectly healthy life without eating animal foods as long as you consume B12, whether from supplements or another reliable source [such as fortified breakfast cereal]," she says.
Some cereals, meat substitutes, soy and rice beverages, and nutritional yeast are fortified with cobalamin, the CDC says. Check the label and check with your doctor.
Actually we are omivores, like a bear, but a bear has teeth somewhat more appropriate to a carnivore than we have. Not surprising since bears, while omivores, are more nearly carnivorous than people. We can and will eat anything that doesn't eat us first, including some things that will try.
His take (these days - now that we know more about nutrition) is that those vegetarians (or even vegans) who are willing to carefully plan their meals, take supplements, and watch their health carefully, can successfully do the trick. But with kids, as you note, it's much harder (especially when they're too young to be personally committed to the program so to speak).
Oh eat your tofu and STFU.
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Your sentence is off... lemme fix :
every child raised by vegan/vegetarian parents will have neurological psychological problems.
False assumption.
Leftists are homo neanderthalenisis liberalis.
Drink real beer (not american p*ss water) and you'll have no problems with calcium :)
MUD
It reminds me of what my biochem friends say: let the liberals eat the organic vegetables. Those are the ones with the toxins on the INSIDE, so it can poison them. We eat the fruit with the poison on the OUTSIDE that you can WASH OFF.
I am like a bear when I don't eat.
When the topic of vegetarianism comes up, I always tell people:
"I am a very strict omnivore."
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