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It's on the shelf in every grocery store and in every book on baby care - but is feeding baby rice cereal actually hurting your child? Extensive studies on cereal are showing it's not the safe, wonderful food you've been taught... and studies on children are showing we've been starting babies on foods they're not ready for.
What problems could "gentle" rice cereal cause? The startling truth is that studies have shown rice cereal is anything but gentle on baby's immature digestive system. Parents who, for decades, have seen their babies start having gas, constipation, bloating, fussiness, and even allergic reactions after starting cereal are finally getting the scientific evidence behind them to be taken seriously. It is not a good food for babies.
Cereal causes a few problems. First, a sixteen year study done in Australia has shown that rice cereal causes far more reactions than either cow's milk or soy - two major allergens. It also causes more severe reactions in the infant's digestive system, causing damage to the gut wall and lining.
The western world tends to think that rice allergies are rare mostly because there's not a whole lot of rice eaten in many countries. Asian countries, however, eat a lot rice and rice allergy is quite common. Rice is not the completely allergy-free food you've been lead to believe.
Another problem with rice is that it's binding. That's right - it clogs the digestive system up. If somebody has diarrhea they're advised to eat mostly rice and bananas to help stop the diarrhea. The rice stops things up - feeding baby rice cereal can cause problems with constipation. Many babies get severely constipated on rice cereal.
Rice, like all cereal grains, is hard for babies to digest. Children don't develop the enzymes to break down starches and grains until after their first birthday. They just don't handle rice, oats, wheat, corn, or other grains well. Many parents have noticed that grains like this go in one end of the baby and come right out the other. They're not being digested at all.
It's is nutritionally poor. Rice just doesn't have a lot to offer your baby! It's fortified with iron that's hard for baby to absorb, and can further increase the constipating effects of rice cereal. Health Canada has even come right out and stated that the iron in rice and other infant cereals is hard to absorb as compared to the iron in meats.
So rice cereal - and other cereals - are not really good for your baby. They're actually pretty bad choices. Consider starting your baby with another solid food choice - one that offers a lot of nutrition and is truly easy to digest.
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