The baby killers are still at large

Sun. 1994 Aug 12:21A.

Abstract

PIP: This newspaper editorial reports that the UN Children's Fund's (UNICEF) executive director and recent US Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient believes that 1.5 million infants would survive annually if breast feeding declines worldwide were reversed. UNICEF adopted the International Code of Marketing of Breast Milk Substitutes in the World Health Assembly in 1981. The code restricts direct advertising, inadequate labels, saleswomen dressed as nurses, and promotion of free samples. The Baby Food Action Network is reported to have released a report which states that baby food companies are still donating free supplies of infant formula to hospitals. The UNICEF position is that provision of free supplies is the most important disincentive to breast feeding. 81 governments adopted the guidelines, but 41 countries have hospitals which accept free samples. 28 of these 41 countries adopted the ban. The Nestle Company, which was cited 20 years age for this practice, won the legal battle and today defies the guidelines in 22 countries, including China, Zimbabwe, and Bangladesh. A US company, Mead Johnson, uses advertising on its label that shows Beatrice Potter's Peter Rabbit being bottle fed. The International Code restricts idealization of bottle feeding. Nutrician, a large conglomerate ownership of US and European infant formula companies, brazenly advertises in the Peruvian daily newspapers with photos of baby milk boxes being donated to hospitals. Dr. Derek Jelliffe, an infant nutritionist, is credited with being the first to publicize the dangers of commercialized malnutrition 21 years ago.

MeSH terms

  • Bottle Feeding*
  • Breast Feeding*
  • Economics
  • Evaluation Studies as Topic*
  • Health
  • Infant Nutritional Physiological Phenomena*
  • Marketing of Health Services*
  • Nutritional Physiological Phenomena
  • Political Systems*
  • Social Change*