death by veganism

[KnottedYet]

Breast milk isn't vegan enough?

Even vegan babies should have BREAST MILK!!! What were these parents thinking?

and it says right on the soy milk box "Not to be used as infant formula" precisely because of stupidity like this.

(I was pretty much vegetarian when I got preggers. I started CRAVING meat, I wanted DEAD RED MEAT for every meal. Figured my body knew what it was doing, so I ate steaks and pork chops to my heart's content.)

[Eden]

Breast milk isn't vegan enough?

Even vegan babies should have BREAST MILK!!! What were these parents thinking?

and it says right on the soy milk box "Not to be used as infant formula" precisely because of stupidity like this.

That was my first thought too! - but the article says that even breast milk from vegan moms is missing some crucial nutrients.....

[skibum]

It's interesting to see how these things get reported by the press. I followed the trial in our local paper. Certainly the appropriateness of a vegan diet for an infant was questioned during the trial but the key points in the conviction were that the child was underfed and the parents never sought medical attention.


Here's a snip from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

"The infant was born in the bathtub of a Buckhead apartment but never taken to a doctor while alive. He was dead when his parents took him to Piedmont Hospital, across the street from their apartment, April 25, 2004. At six weeks old he weighed just 3 1/2 pounds and was so emaciated, doctors could count his bones through his skin.

Fulton prosecutor Chuck Boring said the verdict isn't a condemnation of veganism, a strict form of vegetarianism that doesn't allow the consumption or use of animal products. Instead, jurors believed prosecutors' assertions that the couple intentionally neglected and underfed the child and then tried to use the lifestyle as a shield."

Link to full article. Registration may be required to read it.
http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/met...3metvegan.html

[mimitabby]

That is an individual case. a major point of that article is that this baby was not the first one to die recently from parents who are clueless about nutrition and wanting to be vegan.

[RoadRaven]

Certainly the appropriateness of a vegan diet for an infant was questioned during the trial but the key points in the conviction were that the child was underfed and the parents never sought medical attention.

This is very similar to a case here a couple of years ago where the parents linked their vegetariansim to their religion. They also chose to defend not using the doctor as religious reasining saying praying would be enough (???... did they not read the bit in the Bible that says something like 'God helps those who help themselves'...???)

Our (I say our, because he became the nations. In death, we "adopted" him as very few people wished to allow the parents the right of seeing themselves as such)...

Our (New Zealand's) little boy was older than this one... but still dreadfully ill, and the actions of those who were attempting to raise him showed no understanding of child nutrtion or health requirements... what they did was unforgivable.