Breastmilk of mothers following vegan diet contains two essential nutrients for infant development
Netherlands: Results from an Amsterdam UMC study have found that lactating mothers following a vegan diet compared to mothers with an omnivorous diet showed no difference in the human milk concentrations of vitamin B2 or carnitine despite these nutrients being found in the highest concentrations in animal products.
The results, presented at the 55th Annual Meeting of the European Society for Paediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology and Nutrition (ESPGHAN), showed that a vegan diet does not affect maternal breastmilk concentrations of vitamin B2 and carnitine, nutrients essential for the developing infant.
Using a technique that separates a sample into its individual parts and analyses their mass, this study challenges assumptions that vegan diets may not be nutritionally complete and that breastfed infants of vegan mothers may be at an increased risk of developing vitamin B2 or carnitine deficiency.
The number of vegans in Europe alone has doubled in the last four years. Lead researcher, Dr Hannah Juncker explains, “The maternal diet greatly influences the nutritional composition of human milk, which is important for child development. With the rise of vegan diets worldwide, also by lactating mothers, there are concerns about the nutritional adequacy of their milk. […] therefore, it would be important to know if the milk concentrations of those nutrients are different in lactating women consuming a vegan diet.”
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