The Vegetarian Society of Denmark

A Danish district court in the town of Hillerød has ruled that the administrative unit overseeing hospitals in the region did not discriminate against a pregnant woman when they failed to offer her adequate vegan meals. With the help of the Vegetarian Society of Denmark, Mette Rasmussen decided to file a lawsuit after the hospital she was admitted to during her pregnancy in 2020 did not provide full vegan meals. Instead, she was given side dishes such as plain rice, baked carrots, and celery. This led her to leave the hospital early after giving birth, as she was worried she would not get adequate nutrition for breastfeeding. As a result of this experience, she chose a home birth for her second child to avoid going …

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A lower court in the city of Hjorring, Denmark, has ruled that veganism is a protected belief under Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights. The case was brought by the Vegetarian Society of Denmark on behalf of a small child and her parents. The child had been denied the right to plant-based meals at her kindergarten, and the municipality running the institution had also refused to allow her to bring a packed lunch. In a “milestone win”, the court ruled that the child and her parents had been discriminated against, as they were prevented from practicing their way of living. It acknowledged that vegans have the right not to be “treated worse than people without vegan convictions who are in a similar …

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