Subject: blue baby syndrome

	"Nitrates are naturally occurring nitrogen/oxygen "chemicals" found in almost every vegetable that we eat. Nitrates are also laboratory formulated and used in fertilizers. Nitrates are ingested either from vegetables or drinking water. 
Around the age of three months, an increase in the amount of hydrochloric acid in a baby's stomach kills most of the bacteria that convert nitrate to nitrite. Nitrites hinder proper oxygen transportation in the red blood cells. “Once in the blood, nitrite oxidizes iron in the hemoglobin of red blood cells to form methemoglobin, which lacks hemoglobin's oxygen-carrying ability.”
By the time a baby is six months old, its digestive system is fully developed, and none of the nitrate-converting bacteria remain. In older children and adults, nitrate is absorbed and excreted. Babies who are over the age of 6 months old have developed the stomach acids necessary to fight the bacteria that helps nitrate conversion and subsequent nitrate poisoning.
	In general, large quantities of beets, carrots, and spinach should not be given to infants under 6 months of age because of the high content of nitrate in these vegetables. Due to an undeveloped intestinal system, young infants have low stomach acidity and can convert nitrate to nitrite. Nitrite can displace oxygen in hemoglobin and, under extreme circumstances, this can lead to ‘blue baby’ syndrome. By age 6 months, stomach acidity increases and nitrate overload is less of a problem."
http://foodsafety.wisc.edu/wffoodfactsforyouaug2003.htm
THUS another GOOD reason for the health of our children to wait until AT LEAST 6 months before introducing nonhuman sources of food: they are just not designed for it.
Marie Farver

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