'Breastfeeding not as beneficial as once thought'

[Jojay]

See this link.

www.gm.tv/index.cfm?articleid=26906

(hope the link works)

Comments??

[AneurinBadger]

I'll wait till I;ve read the whole bmj paper before drawing any conclusions.
least they had a bf picture...

[maisym]

will read the whole thing as well - but there are many benefits to bf even if some allergies wheren't conclusive in the study -

[ArthurScarCOD]

ye si laughed
allthose farkign beleding boobs

[ArthurScarCOD]

funny htat ds2 ( bottle) seems our ( relatively)cleverest so far
and most coordinated.

[theUrbanDryad]

i'd be very interested to find out who funded this research. was it government funded? sorry - no time to read article, am on baby patrol (he's just discovered he can stand up!)

[AneurinBadger]

ah yes, extensive trial cod

leave it...

[Jojay]

It doesn't say who funded it but it was in Canada - Montreal Children's Hospital

[ruty]

Hmm. All it said in that article is that breastfeeding did not seem to protect against heriditary asthma and eczema. Er no surprise there, breastfeeding doesn't change your genes. I will look forward to seeing if the full report mentions anything about preventing infant infections in the first years of life, as that is what breastfeeding is about. If it doesn't mention that, then this is extrememly irresponsibly journalism. Surprise surprise.

[AneurinBadger]

it was done by Canadian researchers
in hospitals & clinics in Belorussia
13,000 kids

it is weird beacuse an (admittedly smaller) similar study in Australia in 1999 seemed to show a definite link.

[AneurinBadger]

the original paper didn't look at any other benefits of breastfeeding - it was solely about asthma & allergies.
Abstract here, am trying to get my hands on the full text

[theUrbanDryad]

irresponsible journalism...hmm, quelle surprise...

[Jojay]

It says that the report conluded that breast feeding helps build the baby's immune system, and can help protect against respiratory infections.

It said that it did not appear to reduce the risk of asthma, hay fever or eczema.

[maisym]

I never understand why bf is picked on like this - what about an article on risks of formula?

[ruty]

yes it seems it didn't look at any other benefits at all but good old GMTV are telling everyone breastfeeding is not very beneficial.
And very strange that they did they study in Belarus. One of the most polluted areas in the world. I would expect there to be a much higher allergy rate amongst all children.

[theUrbanDryad]

well, i don't know about Canada, but certainly in the US formula companies have leaned on congress to suppress the reports about the risks of formula.

will find link, hang on...

[Kathyis6incheshigh]

We need Tiktok to fill us in on this really - she usually seems to know stuff about studies!

[purplemonkeydishwasher]

fecking GMTV. typical. TYPICAL!

[Honneybunny]

michael kramer (the resercher who was involved in teh study) did speak at a conference sponsored by nestle in bejing in 2004...

anyway, haven't read the original paper yet, so i am off to do that...

[ruty]

see Aneurin Badger's link.

[ruty]

Talk about conflict of interests Honeybunny..

[Honneybunny]

well we don't know if there were any conflicts of interest for this study, but at least it is an interesting fact that he spoke there...

[theUrbanDryad]

hmm - can't find the link, i'm sure there was something about it one of my friend's livejournal. perhaps it's been removed. i'll have to email her and ask...

[Honneybunny]

actually, i looked up the link and on there there was a link to a controlled trials site, where there was info on the funding: apparently it was funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research Thrasher Research Fund, NHRDP, Health Canada, and by UNICEF. So much for my nestle conspiracy theory...

[ruty]

I still think Belarus is a very odd and atypical study area to use.

[AneurinBadger]

Tis very hard to find populations to test these kind of hypotheses in.
They were killing two birds with one stone.
Beloruss didn't have much support for bf so it was 'virgin' territory to introduce WHO BabyFriendly-type measures to increase bf in randomised clusters, and see if there was a corrseponding drop in allergies.

One huge message from the study should be:

The experimental intervention (breastfeeding promotion modelled on the WHO/UNICEF baby friendly hospital initiative) led to a large increase in exclusive breast feeding at 3 months (44.3% v 6.4%; P