Pregnancy

Babies who are exclusively breast fed by mothers with depleted stores are at great risk for developmental disability. This is a common cause of B12 problems in infants.

Vegetarian and vegan mothers must ensure they are getting enough B12 in order that their children do not suffer harm due to B12 deficiency. The tragedy is that many doctors fail to screen pregnant and nursing mothers for vitamin B12 deficiency which can then lead to misdiagnoses of intellectual disability or autism, when the infants lose their speech, social skills and motor skills.

Text below reproduced with permission from Sally Pacholok  R.N and Dr Jeffrey Stuart’s book ‘Could it Be B12?’

“A recurring theme in medical literature is that B12 deficiency is a fairly rare cause of miscarriage or stillbirth. The evidence, however, suggests otherwise. One recent study, for instance, compared thirty-six women who’d suffered recurrent foetal loss to forty women who’d carried healthy babies to term. The researchers found that 31 percent of the women who’d lost several babies had high homocysteine levels. (Elevated homocysteine is caused by low levels of folate, B12 and/or vitamin B6, and is easily treated with these vitamins).

Sixteen percent of the women who’d suffered recurrent foetal loss carried two copies of the MTHFR gene that causes abnormally high homocysteine levels, and three of the women had overt B12 deficiency. “

Text below reproduced with permission from Sally Pacholok  R.N and Dr Jeffrey Stuart’s book ‘Could it Be B12?’

“More research is needed to determine the incidence of B12 deficiency in women with post natal depression or post natal psychosis. In the meantime, we believe that all women diagnosed with post natal mental illness should undergo screening, including serum B12 and urinary MMA tests. Pregnancy can dramatically worsen a pre-existing B12 deficiency, because B12 is transferred to the growing foetus throughout pregnancy, and prenatal vitamins contain only six micrograms of this nutrient (compared to the 1,000 micrograms needed to treat deficiency). Pregnant women at greatest risk for deficiency include vegans and vegetarians, those with autoimmune pernicious anaemia or malabsorption syndromes such as Crohn’s disease (an inflammatory intestinal disease) or coeliac disease, and those with a history of gastric bypass for weight loss, strict dieting, anorexia, or bulimia. However, any women who develops symptoms of mental illness following pregnancy needs B12 screening.”