a big thing in the news lately is the vegan parents who were tried and convicted of murder after their 6 week old vegan infant died of starvation. they fed the baby soy milk and apple juice when the mother's milk supply wasn't enough. of course a big part of most of the news articles is the attack on vegan diets-- especially children on vegan diets (the link above is one of the few articles i've seen that don't attack the vegan diet, just that the child wasn't fed). that child didn't die from a vegan diet, he died from under-educated parents who were never taught about caring for the baby properly (and obviously never read a soy milk carton label which all state that soy milk is not nutritionally adequate for children under 2). vegan diets done properly are very healthy for mother and baby. probably in this case the parents should have been giving the child formula since the mothers milk supply was not adequate (even though formula isn't vegan). the child was born at home and not taken to a doctor when he continued to lose weight. his death wasn't because of veganism, it was parental stupidity and under-education in how to raise a healthy child. i've seen many responses on people's blogs about this and many many photos of vegan families with healthy vegan children. if zac and i ever change our minds and decide to have kids (not just furry 4 legged ones) they would probably be vegan (or at least vegetarian) from birth (even our 4 legged one is maily vegetarian, except the large chucks of meat and bones from the nieghbour-- we won't buy her any though). it is possible (and not that hard) to get all the necessary nutrients from plant sources.
a few people pointed out that the death of a vegan baby causes a lot of uproar about the vegan diet but how many more omnivorous babies die of starvation each year and we rarely hear about those. also, how many omnivorous children are raised with improper diets and end up with other health issues such as obesity, diabetes and other problems?
basically the bottom line is: the child was not fed properly. for some reason the parents didn't realize what they were feeding him (soy milk and apple juice)was not ok for newborns. they did not seek medical help for their child at all. that is why the child died.
1 comment:
I agree. The mother's milk supply was probably inadequate b/c she wasn't consuming enough calories (minimum of 3000 when nursing) and having a vegan diet was probably a contributor. It is very important for women to be educated about the wellbeing if their young!
Such a sad story.
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