Nearly all pregnant women in China have an unhealthy diet,
according to a survey released by experts from China Center for
Disease Control and Prevention in the city Friday.
The center's Nutrition and Food Safety Institute studied 1,033
pregnant women in 10 major cities including Beijing, Shanghai,
Chengdu and Guangzhou from August 1 to 10 to study their diet and
how much they understood about the importance of nutrition for the
healthy development of the fetus.
"Most mothers-to-be are only familiar with proteins and
vitamins. Many pregnant women do not understand that trace elements
are very important for the fetus. Many women continue to eat their
traditional diet which emphasizes fatty and rich food," said Dr Xu
Qingmei, vice director of the institute.
"Fewer than 60 percent of the women surveyed knew that the
development of intelligence starts from the fetus. The rest
believed the brain developed after a child was born."
She said 96.7 percent of the respondents said they ate too much
or lacked appetite and were not eating diets recommended by their
doctors. The average intake of cereals for the surveyed women was
only 50 percent of the recommended amount. And they consumed less
than 20 percent of the recommended amount of vegetables.
However their diets did have more vegetable oil which doctors
recommend.
"Women should take nutritional supplements containing
docosahexaenoic acid, and choline, a nutrient in the B vitamin
family, between the 18th week of pregnancy and three months after
delivery to enhance a child's brain development," Xu said.
(Shanghai Daily September 3, 2007)