Sorry I have not been able to answer the latest concerns posted by Guillermo
Romero until now.
Colin Campbellís study has also been reviewed in the BeyondVegetarianism
website (www.beyondveg.com). The authorís comments are much like my own, as
delineated in my article on diet in China (www.WestonAPrice.org) The small
number of data points, limited usefulness of the geographical correlations,
the impossibility of drawing conclusions from the studyís ecological data,
the elimination of group-level confounding and the lack of actual income data
are all cited as serious flaws.
Even worse, Dr. Campbell makes claims for his study that are not even true.
For example ìThe China Study report lists only 6 statistically significant
correlations between meat-eating and disease mortally. Further, 4 of the
correlations are negative, which indicates that the mortality rate for the
disease decreased as meat consumption increased. The two diseases that had
positive correlations with meat consumption are schistosomiasis, a parasite,
and pneumoconiosis and dust disease. Thus, the direct evidence of the study
is hardly the condemnation of meat consumption that vegan dietary advocates
may claim it to be.. . . meat intake generally did not correlate with disease
mortality.î
Yet Dr. Campbell continues to claim that it does. He never mentions that
China has high levels of cancer and deficiency diseases. Instead, in a
recent issue of Cornell Magazine (May/June 1999) Dr. Campbell makes the
untenable claim that the vegan diet can protect us against cancer and heart
disease and that a vegan diet is especially important for children.
Letís have a look at what the scientific literature reports on vegan diets
for kids.
>From European Journal of Pediatrics (150(3):205-8 January 1991) ìWe present a
9-month-old exclusively breast-fed baby of a strict vegetarian mother who had
excluded all animal proteins from her diet. The patientís symptoms included
dystrophy, weakness, muscular atrophy, loss of tendon reflexes, psychomotor
regression and hematological abnormalities. Biochemical investigations
revealed severe methylmalonic aciduria and homocysteinuria in the patient,
slight methylmalonic aciduria in the mother and low concentrations of serum
vitamin B12 in both patient and mother.
>From American Journal of Diseases of Children (133(2):141-4 February 1979)
Severe nutritional deficiencies developed in four infants from a new vegan
religious community. They had received breast milk until the age of 3
months. Thereafter, breast milk was supplemented with or replaced by
extremely low caloric-density preparations. All of the infants had profound
protein-caloric malnutrition, severe rickets, osteoporosis and vitamin B12
and other deficiencies. One infant died, while the three others had an
uneventful recovery . After discharge of the infants from the hospital, the
community responded well to a modification of the infantsí diet , which did
not violate their vegetarian philosophy. However, they refused to give their
infants vitamin B12 on a regular basis. [Comment: The three surviving
children ìrecoveredî according to various observable parameters, but
long-term neurological impairment, manifesting, for example, in learning
disabilities, could not be determined at the time.]
I have anecdotal reports, (not in the literature) of children of exclusively
breast-fed babies of vegetarian mothers developing rampant tooth decay,
almost as soon as baby teeth appear! Also anecdotally (not in the
literature), there was a high level of Downís syndrome in children born to
mothers in the vegetarian community of Yogananda in Los Angeles.
There are many studies showing that vegetarians have lower levels of B12 in
their blood. The elderly are another at-risk group because the ability to
absorb B12 declines with age. The level at which a person manifests symptoms
varies considerably. Some show symptoms of B12 deficiency when blood levels
are in the ìnormalî range. Symptoms include anemia, multiple sclerosis,
coronary heart disease, rickets, osteoporosis and psychiatric symptoms such
as paranoia, violence, depression, dementia and fatigue. Tingling and
numbness in the hands and feet, dizziness and nausea are common early signs
of B12 deficiency.
Some who practice veganism can go for many years without signs of B12
deficiency for the following reason, again taken from the BeyondVeg website:
To a great extent, B12 is recycled from liver bile in the digestive system.
This is one reason why vitamin B12 deficiency is rare among vegans, even
those who do not use supplements or supplement foods. The recycling is
summarized by Herbert: The enterohepatic circulation of vitamin B12 is very
important in vitamin B12 economy and homeostasis. Non vegetarians normally
eat ~2-6 mcg of vitamin B12 per day and excrete from their liver into the
intestine via their bile 5-10 mcg of vitamin B12 per day. If they have no
gastric, pancreatic or small bowel dysfunction interfering with reabsorption,
their bodies reabsorb ~3-5 mcg of vile vitamin B12 per day. Because of this,
an efficient enterohepatic circulation keeps the adult vegan, who eats very
little B12, from developing B12 deficiency disease for 20 to 30 years.
[Comment: This explains why some can practice veganism for long periods of
time, while others do very poorly, either abandoning the diet altogether, or
having to ìcheat.î It also implies that individuals from largely vegetarian
societies would have been selected out for better B12 recycling than
individuals from largely carnivorous socieities.] Unlike the vegetarian
whose absorption machinery is normal, the person whose absorption machinery
is damaged by a defect in gastric secretion, by a defect in pancreatic
secretion or by a defect in the gut that produces intestinal malabsorption
will develop vitamin B12 deficiency in 1-3 years, because these absorption
defects block not only absorption of food vitamin B12, but reabsorption of
vitamin B12 excreted into the intestinal tract in the bile.î [Comment: The
difference in length of time for B12 deficiencies to develop would explain
why symptoms of deficiency appear just as frequently in non vegetarians as in
vegans. But the children of vegans remain at risk.]
Some people report improved medical conditions and increased energy levels on
a vegan diet; others report excessive weight loss, digestive dysfunction,
decreased energy levels, sallow appearance, increased susceptibility to
infections, etc. Many who report health benefits at first, develop symptoms
of deficiency over time (not only B12, but also deficiencies of vitamin D,
vitamin A, zinc and iron.) Most at risk are children born to parents who
practice strict veganism.
Traditional societies practiced vegetarianism (including veganism)
occasionally, either for religious reasons or because of famine conditions,
but all put a high value on animal foods for parents-to-be, pregnant and
lactating women and growing children. The way we eat has an effect on future
generations. Letís choose our diet with wisdom and care.
Sally Fallong
www.westonaprice.org
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