Benjamin McLane Spock (May 2, 1903 – March 15, 1998) was an American pediatrician whose book Baby and Child Care, published in 1946, is one of the biggest best-sellers of all time. Throughout its first 52 years, Baby and Child Care was the second-best-selling book, next to the Bible.
No cow’s milk for people at any age say’s Dr. Spock
Dr. Benjamin Spock changed his mind about milk and now says that children and adults are best not to drink milk ,this information in the seventh edition of his book.Millions of parents considered Dr. Spock’s book the Bible on how to bring up their kids.
The late Dr. Benjamin Spock, arguably the most influential pediatrician of all time, has left children and their parents with a surprising and rather demanding legacy: advice that they stick to a vegetarian diet devoid of all dairy products after the age of 2. For most of his life he believed in eating meat and dairy in moderation but in the last edition of his book that came out shortly after he died he now has changed his mind and says that meat and dairy are not required for growing children and it is best to avoid feeding meat and dairy to children . This is new information to me in 2013 but he said this in 1998.
Starting with the first edition of his book in 1946, Dr. Spock always recommended meat and milk products as part of a child’s diet. Dr. Spock’s revisions of what had been his most recent advice — to include small amounts of lean animal foods in children’s diets — stemmed from a switch he himself made to an all-plant diet in 1991, after a series of illnesses that left him weak and unable to walk unaided. His wife, is quoted as saying Mary Morgan that after he gave up meat and dairy, he lost 50 pounds, was able to walk again and regained his health .”It enabled him to revise his book before he died, which was his most important goal,” Ms. Morgan said.Dr. Parker, the book’s co-author and an expert in behavioral pediatrics at Boston Medical Center, suggested that parents at least be offered two alternatives. But Dr. Spock rejected this idea, stating in a letter to Dr. Parker that he wanted his book to be ”in the forefront” of the growing awareness of the link between animal foods and disease.
Dr. Parker said Dr. Spock believed that his vegetarian diet ”had given him a new lease on life.”
”He believed you should try to inculcate a taste for plant foods early on and not acquire a taste for saturated fats, salt, etc.,” Dr. Parker said.
Dr. Parker said that a vegetarian diet ”can be healthy for kids,” if parents make sure children obtain all the nutrients they need, but that he did not believe people had to be vegetarian as children to adopt the diet as adults. Still, he said, ”I think the book is a terrific book. There was no other area in which we had a disagreement.”
Baby and Child Care: Benjamin Spock Interview
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5gZ3EzRFQl4