Belgium will no longer tolerate & # 39; parents who force their children to be vegan



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The Belgian authorities "will no longer tolerate" parents who force their children to be vegan.

It follows a number of cases of children hospitalized and suffering from health complications, or even a death in 2017, related to a vegan diet in the European country.

The government's chief of the rights of the child, Bernard Devos, asked the Royal Belgian Academy of Medicine to decide on the controversial regime, whose members avoid eating meat and dairy products and avoid using products made from animal sources.

The academy did it Thursday, reports a local newspaper The evening, saying that it was "not ethical" to impose veganism on children.

"This restrictive diet requires ongoing monitoring of children to avoid deficiencies and often irreversible growth delays," says the report from the academy.

"It is not suitable for unborn children, children, adolescents, pregnant or breastfeeding women … This concept of nutrition appears to be a form of treatment that is not ethical. to impose on children. "

It has been reported that about 3% of Belgian children lived in vegan families.

Professor George Casimir, from the Queen Fabiola Children's University Hospital, who led the report's writing team, listed potential side effects on British paper. The telegraph.

"We are talking here about psychomotor retardation, stunting, undernutrition, significant anemia, some developments need to be made at a specific time of life and if they are not, they are irreversible. "

Devos said that the legal opinion of the academy will facilitate the removal of children from parents who impose a strict vegan diet and charge them with a crime.

"We can no longer tolerate this endangerment," Casimir said, noting that parents are now at risk of up to two years in prison.

A Belgian vegan couple sentenced in 2017 after the death of his seven-month-old son who died of malnutrition was sentenced to six months suspended prison sentence. A Sydney couple is currently sentenced to five years in prison after her toddler has had a brain attack related to her vegan diet.

The animal rights group PETA rejected the judgment angrily, calling it an "ignorant code".

As PETA pointed out, the American Dietetic Association (American Association of Dietetics) stated that it was acceptable for children to become vegans even from a very young age, provided that the diet be "well planned".

The New Zealand Department of Health does not rule out vegetarian or vegan diets for kids and gives a lot of advice, but warns their "stomach may be too small to contain all the food they need for breakfast. Activity and growth ". It is recommended that parents consult a doctor or nurse to find out what to do.

Newshub.

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