Scare Tactics Aren't the Answer

A couple of hospitals in North Carolina received awards recentlly for not handing out baby bags with free samples of formula in them to new moms leaving the hospital.  Driving this is the belief that if moms get the formula samples it will influence them to stop breastfeeding their children.  There's just no proof of that.  Studies that show why women stop breastfeeding point to more realistic reasons like women having to go back to work, lack of education on the issue, low socio-economic households, and lack of support at home or in the community.  These are the things we, as a society, should work on to increase breastfeeding rates.  Deciding to give out free baby bags without formula samples is not the answer.  (I'd also like to point out that the baby bags have certain brands of diapers in them but no one's worried about that influencing a mother's decision on which diaper brand is best or not).

And, sometimes those samples can save a child's life.  Or they can save a mother's sanity on the night that her child won't breastfeed for one reason or another and the mother has hit a wall.  Baby formula is not the enemy.  I've seen lots written about how breastfeeding can stave off asthma, allergies, even leukemia!  By implication, we are led to believe that feeding your bay formula opens them up to greater risk to those things.  There's just no proof.   Formula is the only safe alternative to mother's milk.  Nothing has come under higher scrutiny by the FDA than formula.  

As World breastfeeding Week wraps up, let's get rid of scare tactics and commit oursleves and our legislators to the real issues that need support like providing more education to those who can benefit from it, extending maternity leaves, and mandating spaces at work for those who want to pump.  Focusing on phony issues like banning baby bags from hospitals detracts from the real work that needs to be done.