Since industrialization, children have been experiencing an overall decline in the nutritional quality of their diets, compiled with a reduction specifically in the mineral content of foods. At the same time, they are exposed worldwide to a greater amount of environmental toxins and other forms of pollution with known developmental impacts. Many types of chronic conditions, ranging from allergies, eczema, asthma, ADHD, upper respiratory infections, stomach infections, ear infections, and obesity, are all on the rise.

For these reasons, Dr. Murray Clarke, founder of ChildLife Essentials, said that much needs to be done within the world of nutrition to address the largely unknown influences on children, whose development is vulnerable to both inadequacies in nutrient intake and harmful environmental toxins.

“Both the U.S. and England have kept records on fruits and vegetables since the early 1940s or 50s, testing among other things their mineral and nutritional content. We see calcium down 29%, magnesium down 21%, and potassium, phosphorous, and iron all down around 30%, and it’s pretty much the same between American and English foods,” he said. “This is not hearsay. The developing brain and central nervous system are much more sensitive to the increasing amount of chemical additives in our junk food, and artificial colors are known to be neurotoxic to some degree.”

Clarke pointed to a study conducted by the Environmental Working Group on the exposures children have to extremely high levels of toxins in today’s environment. The researchers took 10 umbilical cord blood samples from mothers across 10 different states at the moment of birth, screening them for industrial contaminants, pesticides, and heavy metals, and identified over 285 pollutants in these mothers irrespective of the types of environments, rural or urban, that they resided in.

“That means that the child, since the moment of conception, was exposed to all of those contaminants throughout the pregnancy, and that’s what they’re arriving into this world with. This is a huge difference from 30 or 40 years ago,” Clarke said. “Of these 285 chemicals, 208 are known to cause birth defects, effect the nervous system, and are otherwise neurotoxic. These are things that will affect the child over the course of their lifetime.”

With both an increased toxic environmental burden and an increased rate of deficiencies in the diet, Clarke said he believes the role for supplementation is clear. “Nutrition is the body’s first line of defense against environmental contaminants, and children are more susceptible to these contaminants than we are as adults,” he said. “I believe in supplementation for healthy growth and development, environmental protection and detoxification, immune support, and brain and cognitive development.”

The Gut-Brain-Immune Axis
There is great work to be done in exploring the complicated interplay between the gut, the brain and central nervous system, and immune function, according to Katherine Cole, R&D manager at ChildLife Essentials.

Our gut comes into contact with both good and pathogenic microbes, which it needs to be able to identify through things such as gut-associated lymphoid tissue, which hosts immune cells and contributes to the immune function of the gut, Cole said. “There is a barrier function there that, when working properly, allows in nutrients, water, and electrolytes, and also targets pathogens for destruction. Our gut serves as a front line of the immune system when we come into contact with pathogens.”

Exposure to large amounts of pathogens, an unhealthy diet, drugs or antibiotics, environmental toxins, or stressors can all disrupt the gut barrier function, and in children, this can manifest as colic, digestive disorders, allergies, and behavioral issues, Cole said. This is due to dysbiosis and permeability in the gut lining, which results in leakage of various environmental toxins past the gut microbiome.

Nutritional interventions to improve the course of this interplay between gut health and immune function should include a number of ideal ingredients, Cole said, such as colostrum extracts. Colostrum, the first milk that comes from mammals after birth, delivers a strong dose of immune factors which serve as signaling molecules to initiate the immune system, such as immunoglobulins, lactoferrins, and other compounds, Cole said.

“While nutrition is important for a newborn, it’s important to understand that there are these immune factors in colostrum which can initiate immune function in a newborn right away,” Cole said.

Probiotics and prebiotics also may have a useful place in the activation and development of a healthy, mature immune function, Cole said. “In the developmental stages of life, the immune system and gut microbiome are co-dependent when they develop. This is why probiotics are another nutritional approach we can take in early infancy and childhood. When you have ‘good’ bacteria in the gut, they take up space and resources, so there will be less for harmful bacteria. Probiotics accelerate the colonization of the gut in infants, and, in doing so, help to prime the activation of the immune system.”

For similar reasons, Cole said that prebiotics, namely oligosaccharides especially through whole food sources, could have a strong role in supporting the beneficial bacteria in a developing gut microbiome, and confer long-term immune health benefits to children.

“Supporting healthy gut function activates and promotes the development of healthy immune function, and can be done with a focus on a diet with whole foods, fermented foods, and dietary supplements,” Cole said.

Cognitive Function Outcomes
The amount of uncharted territory in the field of research surrounding the gut-immune axis seems to be dwarfed by the unknowns in the area of gut health as it relates to cognitive function, according to Adam Sutter, vice president of quality and scientific affairs at ChildLife Essentials.

“The brain communicates with the gut, and the gut communicates back, but less simply put, it is a bidirectional communication that links the central and enteric nervous systems, linking emotional and cognitive centers of the brain with peripheral intestinal functions,” Sutter said. “When there are dysregulations in that communication, those might manifest in emotional and cognitive disorders in children.”

The four main pathways by which the gut and brain communicate are the neural, endocrine, immune, and metabolic pathways, and optimal gut health can help to optimize these forms of communication. These are modified by nutrition, lifestyle, epigenetics, and stress, Sutter said. “When disruptions occur, you see things like behavioral disorders, digestive disorders, chronic inflammation, and effects on cognitive and brain development.”

What we should consider a cause and what we should consider an effect is not fully understood, Sutter said. Emotional and behavioral disorders can cause gut dysbiosis, which can then exacerbate mental or cognitive symptoms. “What is likely true is that causes become effects, and then these effects can, in turn, become causes,” Sutter said. 

“There is a marked difference between what children need and what they’re getting,” Sutter said, going on to state that children are lacking a diverse range of nutritionally superior foods free from additives and processing. These foods need to be given to children who have a normal amount of exercise, sleep, and stress, and actual physical social interactions.”

“There are four nutritional interventions we feel are important,” Sutter said. “These are DHA, psychobiotics, antioxidants, and bovine colostrum.”

DHA may have a role in the gut-brain axis in addition to its role as a foundational nutrient which supports the healthy development of the brain and photoreceptor cells in the eye, Sutter said. He noted that this fatty acid has been shown to have a role in the quantity and diversity of gut bacteria, the production of short-chain fatty acids, and modulation of pro-inflammatory mediators.

Most psychobiotics are commonly-recognized species that are found in other types of probiotic supplements, Sutter said, but many of these species promoted for digestive and immune health benefits may also have a role to play in cognitive function, specifically when it comes to the production of neurotransmitters such as GABA (gamma-aminobutyric acid) and serotonin.

Adult studies have shown that the antioxidant vitamin C in particular may have an understated role in gut permeability, Sutter noted, with evidence that this nutrient can increase the Lachnospiraceae family of bacteria. This species produces butyrate, an anti-inflammatory compound which has been studied to benefit permeability issues such as leaky gut syndrome.