Wholesome plant-based foods make for strong, healthy bodies with a great head start in life. In the seventh edition of his world-famous Baby and Child Care , America's most respected pediatrician, the late Dr. Benjamin Spock, recommends that parents raise their children on a vegan diet. Children who grow up getting their nutrition from plant foods rather than meats have a tremendous health advantage. I no longer recommend dairy products. But research, along with clinical experience, has forced doctors and nutritionists to rethink this recommendation.
Many children are subtly or violently allergic to milk proteins.
Sniffles and intestinal distress dismissed as colds and colic can actually be signs of lactose intolerance. Pediatricians often find that chronic ear infections and respiratory problems are aggravated when milk is part of a child's diet. Drinking milk has also been linked to asthma and intestinal bleeding and is suspected of triggering juvenile diabetes, a disease that causes blindness and other serious effects. Unfortunately, these antibodies also destroy the cells that produce insulin in the pancreas, leading to diabetes. Humans are the only creatures that drink milk from the mother of another species.