Europe
Europe community on dbzer0. Intended to be a place to discuss European news, politics, or just general topics from a European perspective. Since this is on dbzer0 expect the community to lean more leftist-anarchist but a wide range of views are accepted here (within reason).
Rules:
1. No Bigotry or Hate Speech
Any forms of Homophobia, Transphobia, Queerphobia, Racism, or Ableism will be met with swift and harsh action and will not be tolerated here whatsoever. Bigots will be banned immediately on-sight. This includes apologia of it.
Trying to be politely or intellectually bigoted i.e. "Just asking questions" won't be tolerated.
2. No Zionism
Any forms of Zionism or Zionist rhetoric will not be tolerated here, this includes Zionist apologia, accusations of antisemitism towards anti-Zionists, or blatant denial or downplaying of the genocide towards Palestinians. Any attempt to uphold or prop up the IHRA definition of antisemitism, will be treated as Zionism.
Anyone engaging in Pro-Zionist sentiment or apologia will be actioned in accordance with its severity.
Note: Trying to find loopholes or whataboutery to see what is or isn't genocide denial or Zionism will be treated as a violation of this rule. Don't test us.
3. Stay Civil
Please maintain civil discourse in the community. Do not engage in arguments with others, name-calling, or insults. Note that calling out bigotry or Zionism is not considered an insult. In heated arguments users are encouraged to or even required to disengage failure to do so will result in mod action.
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Spreading of misinformation intentionally in this community is unacceptable and will not be tolerated. Spreading misinformation hurts the credibility of the community and can mislead people sometimes in dangerous ways. Users who intentionally post misinformation as articles, comment answers, or in attempt to win arguments will be actioned swiftly.
Note: This includes Russian and Chinese propaganda. Users with a history of such posting will be banned on sight.
5. No AI Content
Please do not post articles or content primarily created using generative AI. Generative AI content may contain misinformation or be lower quality and thus is discouraged. Posts and comments featuring it will be removed. However this community does not allow or tolerate Anti-AI trolling or hostility and users who engage in such behavior will be actioned for it, additionally Anti-AI trolling violates Rule 3 and often Rule 4 so it is generally unacceptable already.
Note: Rules 1 & 2 may be subject to preemptive mod action due to their severity, and they apply to a user's entire post history. Not just this community.
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I assume you mean this paper. It is the position of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics that, in adults, appropriately planned vegetarian and vegan dietary patterns can be nutritionally adequate So they now limit the recommendation to adults. For older adults they paint an in my opinion pretty balanced take, but the recommendations they make are still applicable to older people that do not eat plant based.
"Facilitating vegetarian dietary patterns in individuals younger than age 18 years and/or for those pregnant or lactating requires specific guidance that considers how vegetarian dietary patterns may influence these crucial stages of growth and development and is outside the scope of this position paper." (source above). The way I am reading this, the paper doesn't mention young and pregnant people because that was not the aim of the paper, and not because they present clear evidence against it.
NHS scotland in 2025 said A vegetarian or vegan diet can be suitable for everyone. However, you might need to consider specific needs at different life stages – for example, children or if you’re pregnant, even though they did not list their sources.
The DGE said in 2024 For vulnerable groups, i.e. children, adolescents, pregnant women, breastfeeding mothers and elderly people, the DGE cannot make a clear recommendation either in favour of or against a vegan diet due to limited available data
The NHS says During pregnancy and when breastfeeding, if you follow a vegan diet you'll need to make sure you get enough vitamins and minerals for your child to develop healthily., though this hasn't been updated since 2022, while the review date in 2025 has apparently passed but the guidance did not get reviewed. There are no sources for this page I can see.
So vegan diets are definitely suitable for adults and maybe or maybe not for other age groups / stages of life.
Just because somebody does eat animal products doesn't mean they automatically have good health, you have to think about how to get your nutrients with any diet. Taking a supplement of B12 / eating fortified foods is not difficult in europe.
I think it's telling that they changed the scope of their position. and the fact that most of the paper is spent detailing how to avoid deficiencies
Okay, but the AND has lots of articles on how to avoid deficiencies while eating animal products, isn't that kind of their job? As well the 2025 AND paper says "The target audience for this article is RDNs, NDTRs, and other health care practitioners." So it makes sense why they detail how to avoid deficiencies.
I am not saying just do whatever. But there are clearly upsides to a plant based diet that to me offset the work you have to do.
If you are interested you can check out acti-veg.