Many foods are labeled as “precocious”
In recent years, there have been many reports of precocious puberty in infants and children, and food is one of the factors that has raised many questions. Can food cause precocious puberty or not? I will start with the recent news and explain each one of them.
1. Vegetables and fruits ripened with plant “hormones
Usually people describe plant “hormones” as “ripening”, most typically cucumbers with thorns, ripening tropical fruits (such as bananas, mangoes), watermelons with puffing agents, anti-seasonal vegetables, and the recent media reports of rootless bean sprouts. Strictly speaking, these effects should be called plant growth regulators, not “hormones” as many media say.
There are many functions of plant growth regulators, some are to promote fruit ripening, some are to let the fruit ripen simultaneously for picking, and some can increase the yield. But no matter what function it is, all plant growth regulators approved for use in China need to be evaluated for safety, and their use within the scope of approval is guaranteed to be safe for consumption. Will plant “hormones” cause premature sexual maturity in humans? The physiological and biochemical mechanisms of animals and plants are completely different, and there is no similarity in chemical structure between plant hormones and human hormones. If plant “hormones” can make people mature sexually, then are you afraid that pollen can make people pregnant? The pollen is the plant’s “sperm”.
2, milk powder
In recent years, from time to time, the media will have to come to a XX milk powder cause infants precocious puberty reports, almost all brands are spared. Many parents even think that the milk is secreted by cows, no doubt there will be cattle hormones.
The iconic incident occurred in 2010 when the Ministry of Health organized a group of experts to study the case, and the testing of Shengyuan samples showed that the estrogen in Shengyuan milk powder was far less than breast milk, and the progesterone level was comparable to that of ordinary milk and breast milk. In the end, a group of experts, including doctors, made a comprehensive determination that the several cases reported at the beginning were individual cases and were not caused by milk powder.
Theoretically, if a best-selling food can cause premature sexual maturity, it would not be a sporadic case, but a relatively concentrated outbreak in time and space. In fact, this logic is not only limited to milk powder precocious puberty, treat all kinds of cases of explosive information can be questioned in this way.
3, colostrum
Now many parents will give their children to eat nutritional supplements, colostrum is one of them. The relevant industry had measured the content of 50 hormones in colostrum in 2009, and the results were not statistically different from ordinary milk. Of course there is data that says the level of hormones in colostrum is 5 to 10 times higher than regular milk, but human milk, especially human colostrum, is generally higher than regular milk and colostrum for the same type of hormones. If the hormones in colostrum (or milk) can cause precocious puberty, then wouldn’t all breastfed children be precocious?
Then why did the Ministry of Health in the “letter on the application of standards for imported colostrum products” mentioned that colostrum should not be added to infant formula? The Ministry of Health’s explanation is that “the physical properties, composition and normal milk is very different, low yield, industrial collection is more difficult, the quality is not stable, not suitable for processing infant formula”, in fact, there is a reason is that formula milk powder can already meet the nutritional needs of children, adding colostrum is not only unnecessary, but also because of the concept of hype misleading Consumers spend more money.
There is a media report that “children with precocious puberty have a common feature: long-term consumption of colostrum”, which actually has a misconception of correlation and causation. I can also find some other common features of these children with precocious puberty, such as “drinking water for a long time, eating for a long time, and eating green vegetables for a long time”, etc.
4. Some animal foods
The most common animal foods that are typically associated with precocious puberty include contraceptive-fed eels and aquatic products, hormone-fed fast-growing chickens, and fattening pigs. Eels fed birth control pills or hormones, has been rumored for many years, and then a media special “proof” topic, the conclusion is that it is impossible to feed birth control pills or hormones, otherwise the eels will die very quickly. Moreover, eels are female when they are young and become male when they grow up, so they do not need any exogenous hormones.
The fast-growing chickens are actually called “big fast white feather chickens”, and the fast-growing is the result of good breeding and scientific feeding. The fast-growing chicken exposed by CCTV is the abuse of antibiotics, which has nothing to do with hormones. If you really play hormones or feed hormones, the health of chickens is not good, and eels are similar to the end.
Excluding the selection of breeding and scientific feeding factors similar to fast-growing chickens, the “fattening” pigs may indeed have hormone problems, but not sex hormones, but beta agonists, which is often referred to as lean meat extract. Its role is to improve the efficiency of protein synthesis and improve the ratio of feed into meat. There have been many cases of poisoning caused by the abuse of lean protein in China, but mainly muscle tremors, abnormal heart rate and other problems, and precocious puberty is not related.
5, tofu, soy milk and other soy products
Some media quoted experts as saying that soy products contain estrogen-like “soy isoflavones” that may lead to precocious puberty in infants and children. This sounds reasonable, but when you think about it, it doesn’t fit the logic of “how can it be harmful when you have been eating it for so many years without any problems”.
In fact, estrogen-like hormones are not as strong as estrogen, and their content in soy products is very limited. It is important to note that some soy isoflavone supplements on the market like to boast of their magical effects, so beware of them “secretly” and secretly adding real hormones.
6, environmental pollution
With the development of the times, scientists have found that some environmental pollutants can produce effects similar to human estrogen, which may affect reproductive development. The most popular ones in the media are Bisphenol A (BPA) and plasticizers, and the public does not often hear about PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls), POPs (persistent organic pollutants) and other concepts. Although it cannot be ruled out that these substances cause precocious puberty, there is no clear scientific evidence to convict them as of now. Therefore ANZ Food Safety Authority concluded after the assessment of BPA that the level of BPA in baby bottles should not be too much of a concern, but as an unnecessary risk, it is still prohibited for use in bottles.
Precocious puberty is divided into true precocious puberty and pseudo precocious puberty. True precocious puberty occurs for complex reasons and can be caused by organic diseases such as intracranial infections, trauma or tumors, or it can be an idiopathic central precocious puberty for which no cause can be found. There are also many causes of pseudogenital precocious puberty, among which gonadal tumors, adrenocortical hyperplasia or tumors are the most important ones. So don’t suspect food indiscriminately and rule out these organic lesions first.
In addition to diseases and other causes, precocious puberty may also be related to unreasonable diet, excess nutrition, excess energy, and indiscriminate consumption of supplements. The children with precocious puberty mentioned earlier all ate colostrum, and if we look deeper, we may find that their nutritional status is too good. It is also common to see some obese children with abnormal hormone levels, and some young boys even have estrogen levels that are higher than those of adult women. Some parents also give their children to take supplements, even adult supplements, some so-called health products even “blue hat” are not, eating problems is also very normal.
7, trick to avoid precocious puberty
How to avoid the risk of precocious puberty? Some domestic doctors suggest not to eat chicken, anti-seasonal vegetables, some foreign doctors suggest vegetarianism, these are not reliable. In general, I think the more reliable are these points.
1, reduce the use of plastic products.
2, try not to give children to eat nutritional supplements (including colostrum), without the “blue hat” logo must not eat.
3, from childhood to train children cereals, vegetables, meat, eggs and milk of a reasonable mix, do not think that high protein is good food.
4, do not let children drink juice, drinks as water, to avoid excessive energy intake.
5.Play and exercise more with your child.
6, parents who have eaten oral contraceptives, must be put away, the child’s curiosity is anything dare to turn out to eat.
7, if there are signs of precocious puberty, go to the regular hospital, do not blindly suspect food.
The child is not necessarily eating wrong, eating bad, but also may be eating too well, or even simply eating too much …… This happens not only to children, but also to adults who worry today about this toxic, tomorrow feel that harmful, but completely ignore the issue of daily diet nutritional balance.