A Parent’s Guide to Avoiding Heavy Metals in Baby Food
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Every parent wants their baby to be as healthy as possible. However, there is an issue with the amount of heavy metal exposure baby’s experience. This could contribute to health issues down the road. For that reason, we’ve outlined some tips to lower your baby’s heavy metal exposure below.
Can Heavy Metals Harm Your Baby?
Toxic heavy metal exposure can be harmful to a baby’s developing brain. A high amount of exposure to heavy metals could lead to cognitive and behavioral issues in your child down the road. That’s why it’s a good idea to reduce your baby’s exposure to heavy metals however possible.
How Do Heavy Metals Get Into Baby Food?
Metals are in many of the ingredients in baby food. Some of the food types with the highest levels of metals include infant rice cereal, puff snacks, teething biscuits and fruit juice. The most common metals found in foods include lead, mercury, arsenic and cadmium.
Lowering Your Baby’s Exposure
The amount of heavy metals found in most baby foods is low. That said, here are some tips to reduce your baby’s exposure further:
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Provide a Variety of Foods
The more variety your baby has in foods, the more balanced their diet will be and the lower their exposure to heavy metals is likely to be. Variety isn’t just important to reduce heavy metal exposure, but it also helps keep your baby healthy in general.
2. Avoid Fruit Juice
Certain fruit juices contain absurd amounts of heavy metals. If your child is under the age of one, they shouldn’t be consuming juice anyways since it can cause weight gain and cavities.
3. Choose the Right Types of Rice
Brown rice tends to have the highest arsenic levels. For this reason, you may want to serve rice dishes using sushi rice and white basmati rice.
4. Eliminate Lead Hazards in Your Home
Food isn’t the only source of heavy metals that can contaminate your baby. For example, chipping paint from older homes can be a substantial source of lead exposure. Make sure you evaluate other sources of heavy metals in your home so you can minimize your baby’s exposure.
5. Test Your Tap Water
Tap water may have heavy metals in it as a result of the lead pipes that it is channeled through. For this reason, it’s important to test the heavy metal levels in your tap water. You may want to avoid hydrating your baby with tap water in general, just to err on the side of safety.
6. Breastfeed When Possible
Sometimes, baby formulas contain high levels of heavy metals. To avoid this exposure, if possible, breastfeed your child.
Final Takeaways
It can be difficult to raise a healthy child. It’s almost impossible to shield them from all of the hazards life has to offer. That said, it’s still important to do everything in your power to keep your little ones healthy. One of the ways to do that is to reduce their exposure to heavy metals with our tips above.
