Why is This Child Slow?
This is a question that bogs the minds of teachers and parents of children with “special needs”. Even though many delays in children’s developmental milestones are due to unavoidable congenital mutations or defects, many neurological and cognitive problems children have could be avoided through the lifestyle choices their parents make.
One such choice is to choose to eat fish that’s low in mercury. Catfish is abundant in Nigeria and is one of our traditional culinary dishes. Catfish is good to serve children because it is an excellent ‘brain food’. Catfish is one of the safest options for pregnant and breastfeeding mothers.
Furthermore, cat fish’s fat content is significantly low. It is therefore a good food choice for maintaining the right body weight, with the promise of a slimmer waistline. Cat fish contains Omega 3 and 6 fatty acids, which your heart and brain need for good functioning. Cat fish provides your body with amino acids which are proteins that help your body build leaner muscle bulk, among its many health benefits. These proteins also improve the effectiveness of your immune functions.
Regular servings of cat fish give you nearly half the amount of vitamin B12 you need to eat daily. Among other functions, B12 plays an important role in digestion and nerve functioning. You’d be pleased to know that cat fish is low in mercury. Pregnant mothers should be particularly cautious when buying fish as many fish contain mercury.
Mercury is a highly toxic element which has no benefit to the body. Oceans, rivers, saltwater and freshwater are inadvertently contaminated with methylmercury which is a highly toxic form of mercury that builds up in fish, shellfish and animals that eat fish. Mercury finds its way into aquatic waters by being washed in via industry and household waste, sewage-water treatment system, leaking water from mined soil and draining from landfill. Invariably, aquatic food chain becomes contaminated with this pollutant, mercury.
Even though short-term and long-term exposure to mercury can cause adverse effects during any period of a human being’s development, ingesting high levels of mercury can particularly harm the fetus and young children by damaging their developing nervous system. Signs and symptoms of methylmercury poisoning include: peripheral vision, lack of coordination, speech, hearing and walking impairments, and muscle weakness.
If you are trying to get pregnant, you are pregnant or are breast feeding, you should avoid eating shark, swordfish and marlin. Also, eat tuna fish sparingly at these times because all of these fish are high in mercury..