Can a Child be Healthy on a Plant-Based Diet?

A plant-based diet can keep you healthy in every stage of life. Even a plant-based diet which includes only plant foods and nothing else.

There is much information available on the benefits of a plant-based diet in all stages of life. It is healthy for  infancy, childhood, adolescence, pregnancy, lactation, middle age and old age.  But just like with any diet,  you have to know how to do it right to make it work.

Even the Bible condones it

In the book of Genesis, the original diet God gave Adam and Eve was plant foods only:

God said, “I have given you every plant with seeds on the face of the earth and every tree that has fruit with seeds. This will be your food.”

Genesis 1:29

The Bible indicates that meat-eating only came in after the great flood of Noah. At that time, with all crops decimated by flood, God condoned meat eating.“

Everything that lives and moves will be your food. I gave you green plants as food; I now give you everything else.”

Genesis 9:2-3

That means all the children before the flood were also eating only plants.  AND they were living to grand old ages – until after the Flood. Perhaps one reason for the much shorter lifespans after the flood could be because of this massive dietary change. After all, meat-eating has been proven to shorten productive life today too.

Considerations with Children

Eating only plant foods during pregnancy and lactation means you have to know you are getting it right. The same goes for feeding infants and young children a plant-based diet. A growing child does not have as much room for ‘error’ in their small, developing bodies as does a grown adult with plenty of stores of most nutrients.

If you are anticipating pregnancy or have a small child you wish to arm with this potential gift of health, here are some things you can read to learn how to do it right.

Educate Yourself

• Disease-Proof Your Child by Dr Joel Fuhrman is excellent and, though a bit more in depth, 
• Becoming Vegan by Brenda Davis and Vesanto Melina (registered dieticians) is exceptional.  

These health professionals explain how to do plant-based eating right during pregnancy and lactation. They also lay out how to feed plant-eating kids of all ages well. 

The main concerns are that you and your child are getting a good source of

1. Omega 3 fats
2. Vitamin B12 and
3. Vitamin D

Here is an easy to read article on babies and plant-based diets.  Please read it <here> if you are contemplating pregnancy or raising children on a plant-based diet.  It includes the recommendation of the American Academy of Pediatrics to no longer give children cow’s milk. In also cites Dr Benjamin Spock’s recommendation to not feed animal foods to children.

Balanced Nutrition

All diets have inherent weaknesses to which attention must be paid. The standard Western diet is inherently low in fibre, antioxidants and several important vitamins such as folate; it is too high in heme iron, calories and inflammatory fats. Not paying attention to these weaknesses sets you up for ill health.

The weaknesses of a plant-based diet are low Vitamin D, low Omega 3s and insufficient Vitamin B12. Iodine and zinc may also be lacking without careful attention. These must be supplemented in one way or another, or attention paid to optimising these elements within the diet.

Protein

Contrary to popular knowledge, protein is not lacking in a plant-based diet. As long as a person eats enough food overall, there will be sufficient protein present.

Children on plant-based diets do not grow smaller than their peers. Their height is based upon their genes; as long as they have sufficient food, they will reach their optimal height. However, they are very likely to find they do not become as fat as their peers; a plant-based diet makes it easier to maintain a normal weight at all ages.

Don’t Leave Out Vitamin B12

Vitamin B12 is vital for building DNA and red blood cells, particularly in times of rapid growth like childhood.  It maintains protective sheaths around nerve fibres and limits a damaging substance that weakens inner arterial walls (homocysteine). High levels of homocysteine triggers heart disease.

From time to time we hear about a tragic infant death to vegan parents.  It hits the news and puts a black mark against plant food diets.  People understandably fear limiting animal foods with their children.

These vegan infants usually have one thing in common.  Usually their parents failed to include a reliable source of Vitamin B12 during pregnancy and lactation for the mother. Then the baby was not given a B12 supplement upon weaning.  

Vitamin B12 is made by bacteria in the soil.  In the past, our ancestors did not have the sanitary conditions we live in today. As a result, getting enough Vitamin B12 was not difficult.  They drank from natural streams and rivers, handled animals and ate home grown vegetables with some dirt left on them.

The reason meat has Vitamin B12 is because animals live in what we would call ‘unsanitary conditions’, eating from the ground and drinking dirty water.  The B12 is stored in their flesh, milk or eggs. Eating animals is how most Westerners obtain Vitamin B12.  

By adulthood, most of us have B12 stores for up to 3 years in our own livers.  Some people have enough for 20 – 30 years without eating any more meat products! However, babies and children have NO stores of Vitamin B12, so supplementation is always needed.  

Science not culture

If I had my time over, I would raise my children without animal foods. Or at least I would keep them only for occasional events.  

If we were to base our dietary choices on solid science rather than on our culture, we would stop eating animal foods today.

It is our culture that tells us “it can’t possibly be so bad” and blinds us to the truth. The truth is however, that children can be much much healthier, in childhood and beyond, on a well-planned plant-based diet than they can hope to be on a diet that regularly includes animal foods.