Soy: healthy protein or cause of avoidable harm?
Should pets eat soy / soya?
The origins of Soy date back to China, where it remained resident until around 1895 when the Japanese began importing it as a fertilizer. It was not imported into Europe until 1908, but had been used as a forage crop in America back in 1879, and was used as hay until the 1920’s, however the advent of World War II saw increased production, by the 60’s and 70’s America produced more than 75% of the Worlds’ Soy, mostly going into animal feed.
Soy has been utilised in pet foods now for a number of years as proximate analysis is up to 40% protein and 22% fat, being a legume it is not species appropriate for our carnivorous pets and is high in lectins, designed by nature to disrupt digestion and have been associated with diabetes, obesity, and cardiovascular diseases (Kalander, 2012). With America being the world leader in soy production it is worth noting that 91% of the soy produced in the United States is GMO.
GMO soy has been found to:
- kill baby rats in just 3 weeks
- stunt growth
- raise mortality rates
- induce sterility
- produce mutations
- cause DNA damage, abnormal sperm, blood changes, and damage to liver, kidney and testes
- produce malformations in pigs including ear atrophy, spinal and cranial deformations, hole in the skull, and leg atrophy. In one piglet, one eye was not developed; it had a single large one (cyclopia, a malformation observed in Argentine populations exposed to Roundup spraying). There were piglets without a trunk, with an “elephant tongue”, and a female piglet with testes. One malformed piglet had a swollen belly and the foregut and hindgut were not connected.
- be toxic to the normal metabolism
- produce a higher rate of severe stomach inflammation
The old adage “one mans’ food is another mans’ poison’ could not be more relevant.
For more information we recommend this article “Soy in Pet Foods: The Unwholesome Truth” by Pet Nutrition Blogger Rodney Habib
Turner, H.B. (2015) Soy: healthy protein or cause of avoidable harm? Healthful Dog 2[2]:112
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Unless fermented (as in soy sauce, miso, tamari etc.), soy is not only very unhealthy for pets, but also for humans and should therefore be absolutely avoided to prevent soy-related health problems.This includes tofu, soy milk and textured vegetable protein, plus all the soy added to many processed foods,including some baby formula. . .
Agree with you totally there Erwin, we avoid it like the plague here, organic or not, we don’t touch it.