When a mother has her new child, she faces a tough decision: breastfeed or formula feed? Perhaps a combination of both? Many mothers have reservations about breastfeeding because of the time commitment and concerns over producing enough milk, but also fear that formula feeding could impact their baby's health. Are these fears warranted, or is formula feeding a safe and effective alternative to the natural method?
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Bottle feeding is like taking your newborn to McDonald's everyday. They get the same nasty tasting stuff day after day with little to no positive effects. Yes, they can grow and develop with formula. Yes, formula feeding continues to be better accepted by the public (we can watch a murder and be fine but god forbid we see a child at breast!). We have to work to change that.
Most, if not all, states require workplaces to provide a place to pump that is not the employee's bathroom. These places are not always utilized because these same places do not provide the time needed to pump. Thus, we get the feeling that society still does not feel breastfeeding is a valued experience. Who is making these decisions in society? Men that have no idea what breastfeeding entails? Men that don't understand the bonding or immunologic points to breastfeeding? Or is it the formula companies telling us that yes, formula is safe and almost like breast milk?
Yes, how you feed is a choice but if women are making the decision out of convenience, how can they be making an informed decision? How can they truly understand the benefits of breastfeeding if they don't hear them? WIC is doing better with the breastfeeding promotion but they still have a long way to go. Breastmilk is free, formula costs anywhere from $2000 on up per year.
To me, something that is labeled as "formula" belongs in the high school chemistry classroom and not in our precious newborns.
- missinu3400
October 1, 2008 1:46PM
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Formula is an Ongoing Experiment
- From La Leche League International
By La Leche League International - Happy Mothers/Breastfed Babies
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The truth about formula
If the dear reader would do a google search for "HHS Toned down Breast-feeding ADs", she would discover that our very own government in collaboration with the American Academy of Pediatrics, gutted an ad campaign about the health risks of formula. According to research from the CDC, babies that are not breastfed are 40% more likely to develop Type 1 diabetes, and 250% more likely to develop respiratory disease.
Doing a search on the National Library of Medicine's PubMed on "milk proteins in the etiology of insulin dependent diabetes" will retrieve 142 citations. Most formula is derived from cow milk.
Currently, there are 9 theories as to why formula is associated with diabetes.
The evidence says that formula feeding is the first step towards overweight/obesity and diabetes, both of which are epidemic in the US.
Drs Rogan and Chen calculated that 720 babies die every year in the US because they are not breastfed.
The public does not know this. At least one-third of the public believes that formula is equivalent to human milk. Industry encourages this belief through marketing and by giving free samples of their product away to new mothers.
Mothers can't make informed choices if the information is kept from them.
I want the truth to be told to all.
warmly,
Nikki Lee
- Nleeguitar
September 25, 2008 6:20PM
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Baby's immature immune system
Human babies are born with immature immune systems. That's why they can get sick very easily and quickly. They depend on their mother's milk until their immune system if fully developed. There are many things about this relationship that I find amazing. Mother's milk not only helps her baby fight infection, it also helps her baby's immune system develop stronger and faster. For example, the thymus, an important organ in the immune system and the site for production of T-lymphocytes, is 2X's bigger is fully breastfed babies compared with exclusively formula-fed babies. Breastfed babies also have more of these T-lymphocytes circulating in their bodies.
Another important part of this relationship is that the ingredients of human milk - proteins, sugars and fats - all provide both nutrition for the baby's growth and protection against illness. And what I find truely amazing is that these cells fight infection without causing inflammation, so baby can continue to use all his or her energy on growth. Some of the cells line the digestive and respiratory tracts destroying germs and providing a barrier to prevent germs from entering baby's body. Others promote the growth of "good" bacteria (low-virulent E.coli) in the baby's gut.
Because of the living cells in human milk and how they provide babies with protection against illnesses, there is no comparison between breastfeeding and formula-feeding.
Reference: Hanson, L. Immunobiology of Human Milk: How Breastfeeding Protect Babies. Amarillo, TX:Pharmasoft Publishing, 2004.
- Linda Wieser
September 27, 2008 11:00AM
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Number 2.
Formula does not harm babies. Breastfeeding is best, but formula doesn't harm babies. Nothing in these "arguments" gives any evidence that formula is harmful. Only that it's not as good as breast milk.
- SocialistBetty
December 24, 2008 12:24PM
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Formula does harm babies
Your analogy of breastmilk is better, but formula does not harm babies is like using the analogy of a car crash victim, who died of a stroke, but wasn't adversely effected by the crash. The victim died of a stroke, that was brought on by the crash. Indirectly, the crash killed the victim. This is the same analogy of formula, certain biological sequences were set off from not having the optimum food, thus diabetes sets in or obesity. I would say that it caused harm.
Risks are harmful, if they come to fruition. They are real. It's like playing russian roulette, you never know what trigger pull will kill you. So when the bullet does come out and kill or maim someone, I'd say that it caused harm, even though the person knew it was a risk and did not believe it to be real or really statistically probable.
- Iknowbetter
January 25, 2009 1:28AM
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