00:02This is Daddy's favourite colour.
00:05Hope Castillo is your typical five-year-old who loves colouring and playing with her friends.
00:11Can you draw some more?
00:13But as a toddler she had trouble focusing and her energy levels were low.
00:17That was until she was diagnosed with a severe iron deficiency.
00:22We're not even aware that she is low in iron.
00:26But we find her have low appetite, she's very timid.
00:31Hope was put on an iron supplement and her parents were told to decrease her cow's milk intake.
00:38Apparently it affects her absorption of iron.
00:42Health experts say children under five should not consume more than 500 mils or two cups of cow's milk a
00:48day
00:49because it can cause iron deficiency anemia which can be life-threatening.
00:54There have been three toddlers who have died in Queensland in the last two years
00:58and their deaths were contributed to an excess of cow's milk.
01:02That is they were drinking more than one litre of cow's milk per day.
01:05One small virus can unfortunately be life-threatening when you've got a chronic anemic state.
01:10Queensland Children's Hospital data shows the number of children with severe iron deficiency anemia
01:16who presented to its emergency department more than doubled in five years
01:20from 39 in 2020 to 86 in 2025.
01:26One of the theories we have is that cost of living pressures might have increased our rates
01:30given that the cost of cow's milk is roughly a dollar per litre.
01:33The other thing that may have changed is the reliance on ready-made food pouches.
01:38On the other side of the country an ongoing study of about 10,000 Perth women and their babies
01:44found that by three years of age 56% of children had low iron, roughly 20% had very low
01:51iron
01:52and 2.6% had severe iron deficiency anemia.
01:56It's a hidden health crisis, you know, because you need to do the blood test to pick this up.
02:03The good news is it's an entirely preventable condition.
02:07Home cooked meals prioritise red meat for children where possible and reduce cow's milk.
02:13Some iron-rich foods may even appeal to your child's sweet tooth.
02:18Dark chocolate also helps her with her low iron.
02:22It's a large amount of light that isn't the especially old one.
02:23The red cow is covered in 10-13,000 per year and it's two decades.
02:25The pure iron, the real iron, the real iron, the red cow is covered in half of five years.
02:27And this is a big deal because it is so low-reacting.
02:28The red cow is covered in five years, it's justified by 15-15 minutes before the chicken.
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