Lumen Foods, an American manufacturer of soy-based foods and beverages, has posted warning labels on its soymilk products in response to growing research that the high manganese levels found in soy beverages, and in particular, infant formula, may be neurotoxic to infants under the age of six months.
The label reads: "WARNING: Soymilk may be detrimental to infants under 6 months of age.
It contains manganese at levels important to human nutrition but over 50 times the level found in mother's breast milk."
Lumen Foods president George Ackerson says the company is concerned for two reasons.
There are growing evidence of a correlation between manganese in soymilk and neurotoxicity for infants; and the company could be held liable if it does not take proper action when scientific research exists.
Lumen Foods sells a small line of soy beverages, which could conceivably be used as infant formula.
The company has never sold a distinct line of baby formula.
This recommendation came after the company's founder Greg Caton investigated claims linking manganese in soymilk with brain damage in newborn mammals.
A similar phenomenon was found in human infants in one study; and in another, by Dr. Louis Gottschalk, elevated manganese levels were found in the scalp hair of adolescents incarcerated for violent crimes.
Separate interviews by Caton revealed the possibility that soymilk use in small infants could correlate to the dramatic increases in ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) and violent adolescent incidents over the last 40 years.
So far, it is known that newborn infants cannot metabolise levels of manganese comparable to adult capability.
The FDA's recommendations just show that: infants require only 0.005 mg per day, whereas adults can metabolise 1.2 mg per day.
In addition, once manganese is stored in neural tissue, excess manganese and its effects can remain for years.
"I've been following anti-nutritional claims again soy products for almost 20 years," notes Caton.
"Over 99 per cent of them are readily dismissible.
We are not telling people not to drink soymilk.
We are just warning parents to consider that their newborn infants are not capable of metabolising significant levels of one of its mineral nutrients, and there could be negative consequences to this."
Source: Lumen Foods