Pregnant Women in India Told to Look at Cute Babies and Avoid 'Lusty Thoughts'

New guidance from India's Central Council for Yoga and Naturopathy, a government body that promotes traditional and homeopathic medicine, has attracted widespread ridicule after making a series of scientifically inaccurate recommendations for pregnant women in a booklet entitled Mother and Child Care. The recommendations include: not eating meat or eggs, avoiding "lusty thoughts" during pregnancy, and looking at pictures of beautiful babies to benefit the fetus.

"Pregnant women should detach themselves from desire, anger, attachment, hatred, and lust," the guidance reads, advising that pregnant women should also stick to a vegetarian-only diet. Eating meat is a hugely contested topic in the predominantly Hindu country, where cows are considered sacred and violence has frequently flared up between India's Hindu and meat-eating Muslim communities. But in a nation with an extremely high maternal mortality rate, where many deaths could be prevented by better nutrition, doctors reacted angrily to the ministry's recommendations.

Arun Gadre, a gynecologist who works in poor rural areas, told AP: "If the calories of expectant mothers are further reduced by asking them to shun meat and eggs, this situation will only worsen. This is absurd advice to be giving to pregnant women in a country like India."

Advising Indian women to shun nutritious, calorie-dense foods like meat and eggs is actively dangerous in a country where, due to patriarchal social attitudes, many women eat much smaller portions of food than their partners or children. In some households—specifically low-income households where food provision is limited—women eat last, after the men and children. One recent survey found that 60 percent of women in Uttar Pradesh, and a third of Delhi-based women, ate after men. Additionally, women in rural areas often lack the financial means to supplement their diets, and have to undertake exhaustive domestic chores as well as agricultural work.

What this means in practice is that many Indian women are underweight. During pregnancy, it can lead to malnutrition that can imperil the safety of their fetus and stunt the child after birth if they breastfeed.

"This advice is detrimental to women's heath," Amit Sengupta of the Delhi Science Forum told the AP. "Undernourished girls grow into undernourished women. Married by their families while still in their teens, these girls become pregnant by the time they are 17 or 18, when their bodies have not matured enough to safely deliver a child."

Defending the booklet, traditional medicine minister Shripad Naik said that it "puts together relevant facts culled out from clinical practice in the fields of yoga and naturopathy."

"While a vegetarian and vegan diet is safe for women during pregnancy, they need to make sure they get enough iron and vitamins B12 and D," comments Dr. Vanessa Mackay of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists. "It's perfectly safe for women to have sex during pregnancy, and there is no evidence to suggest that it harms the baby. The baby is cushioned by the amniotic sac and well beyond the cervix, and a man's penis cannot penetrate beyond the vagina."

A spokesperson for Britain's Faculty of Public Health declined to comment on the Indian guidance specifically, but referred me to their recommendations for pregnant women. "Eat some protein foods every day," it reads, "to include beans, pulses, fish, eggs, meat (but avoid liver), poultry and nuts."

As I couldn't find any guidance on avoiding impure thoughts during pregnancy, I'm guessing it's probably okay.