Why would the charity Tommy's think it's a good idea to "team up" with Aptamil?!

[tabouleh]

Tommy's and Aptamil's midwifery training grants.

Unbelievable.

It gets the Aptamil logo onto Tommy's website.

Tommy's should be encouraging BFing not giving space to a formula company on its website and sposoring midwives!

Aptamil must be so pleased with themselves.

I disagree. Tommy's should be doing what it was founded to do. If you lose a baby and want to know why you don't care where the money which helps look into this comes from.

If you have a sick baby or a premature baby you want the best advice and support possible.

There is so little money around for this type of work and having had both a miscarriage/ectopic and a very premature baby (who I BF) I am happy for them to take whatever money they are offered. Formula is not poison, and for sick and prem babies it is in fact often medicine

"If you are unwilling to receive money from a company that promotes breast milk substitutes, please do not apply for one of these training grants."

So basically those midwives with a real commitment to breastfeeding and an understanding of the international code on milk substitutes, you can off.

This is horrible, horrible. How utterly cynical of aptamil to do this.

It's one of the most basic forms of advertising; get featured right up there with the 'good guys' and they'll become good by association. Then of course you have midwives using biased training materials, with a nice dollop of brand awareness to boot. Sigh.

I don't see that a midwive with a real commitment to BF couldn't take the money and then use it to promote BF.

Don't get me wrong I support BF, I have BF my son through great difficulties but give Tommy's a break they are doing what they think is the right thing and if it allows them to do more then so be it

Read the page:

"We have defined training as events which will increase your knowledge or skills in the areas we have defined."

So Aptamil will hold events for the MWs to attend, full of Aptamil sales types and Aptamil promo materials that they'll hand out to the MWs. At what point is this not a hard bloody sell of Aptamil?

It's been proven that targetting breastfeeding mothers is more profitable than targetting those who decide to FF, this is just doing it by proxy (and like I said, making Aptamil out to be good guys to all those who see they're joined with Tommy's as a bonus)

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I suggest you read The Politics of Breastfeeding hildathebuilder - this sort of thing is well covered in there.

hildathebuilder

Formula is not poison, of course it's not.
I was glad that it was available for my DS.

But I think there is a FF culture in this country which is contributed to be advertising and the way the formula companies conduct themselves.

We have one of the lowest BF rates in Europe.

In coutries where FF advertising has been banned and BF support and proper training introduced rates have gone up.

This doesn't mean that women struggling in this country are lying/weak/silly - they have messages all around from people saying on just use formula it's easy.

The general public in this country doesn't know what a BFing relationship looks like - feed on demand/night waking/cluster feeds/growth spurts etc.

"for sick and prem babies it is in fact often medicine" - yep totally agree - as it is like medicine there should be comprehensive instructions on how to make it/detailed ingredients lists/evidence based research on it etc etc.

Look at my posts at the end of this thread.

Nutrimgen is a special formula and they are only just now implementing the guidelines.

Fair enough if they disagreed with them they could have said so - but no - big wall of silence.

I did ask them a follow up Q:

"the guidelines have been around for several years please can you explain why you have only just recently put them on your packaging?"

The answer: In response to your question, changes to tin labels and packaging can take time and especially when individual country recommendations impact a global brand such as Nutramigen.

Time! What 4 years FFS.

Please understand that it is possible to be pro-choice/pro-formula but anti formula advertising and anti the way formula companies operate.

They will doubtless share such gems with the chosen midwives as "women with small breasts need to feed their babies more" as claimed on their 'professionals' website

From that Tommy's website:

"If you are unwilling to receive money from a company that promotes breast milk substitutes, please do not apply for one of these training grants."

ROFL

QOFE, that's not quite what they said, and I would like to see the full article to understand the context etc.

What they actually said was:
"The size of a woman?s breasts has no bearing on the amount of breastmilk she can produce, although babies of women with smaller breasts will often have to feed more frequently."

"often" is an important qualifier. "frequently" is an important modifier ("more" is not the same as "more frequently"). I don't know whether what they say is true. At least one link suggests it should not be instantly dismissed: www.007b.com/breast_size_breastfeeding.php

I really don't think it is ever going to be a good idea to obtain BF info from a FF company.

I really just want to say again, Tommy's are a charity. They are trying to half the number of babies who die during pregnancy by 2030. Having had one baby that died (albeit as a miscarriage), and one that nearly did to the extent that I sat in the delivery room after my DS was born talking to my DH about what we'd do if he didn't pull through for the first few hours he was in Nicu I firmly believe that the more they can do the better. If that means they take their 30 pieces of silver from aptamil or whoever so be it.

Perhaps its difficult for me to see this as being purely about BF when you come from my position, let alone about the politics of BF. I see it as being about life or death. And I know which I see as more important.

but I agree i don't think its good to get BF (or FF) from a formula company. I'd rather get it from the nhs, doctors etc after proper research has been done

hilda - the money is going to midwives as a research grant - it's not even going to the charity - unless they made a separate donation- if they did make a donation there is no information on that page.

I would think that there was a donation but we don't know that yet.

I am very sorry for yout loss and for the traumatic time you had with your DS but there are many many other places from which Tommy's can obtain funding. There are not reliant on FF companies.

Companies which support Tommys

err because aptimil will give them some much needed money????? they ARE a charity after all, beggers cant be choosers and all that

At this stage we do not know what the research grants will cover, but it specifically say:

"We will support training courses which cover the promotion of breast feeding or the care of women who are at risk of, or have experienced a miscarriage, premature birth or stillbirth"

I personally read that as saying that is what the grants are for. Maybe i shouldn't have done, but I simply do not believe that the board of Tommy's when deciding to accept this money did not consider whether the link with Aptamil was overall consitent with their purposes and it is the CEO and FD of Tommy's who will review the grants.

We need research into miscarriage, premature birth or stillbirth. Tommy's amongst others does that research. You say there are many place where Funding comes from. No doubt there is but in a country where we do not have one to one care for babies in Nicu, where when you have a miscarriage the doctors start by saying its probably one of those things, when you have a prem baby they say its probably one of those things. When the causes of most prems, are unknown, and there is often no information on why it happened or whether it will happen again the more knoweldgeable the midwives profession is the better.

I am not after sympathy. I do not particularly expect anyone to agree with me. But we live in a capitalist society (more's the pity) funding is being cut for research (more's the pity)and the NHS (more's the pity) companies including formula companies are trying to make money when there is little money about at the moment. Charities are being squeezed like the rest of us. If they can get money from the formula companies why should they turn it down?

I don't particularly support Aptamil, or the FF companies, I think its disgraceful that they did not change the instructions on how to make up formula. I think follow on milk is a con, and think how some companies behaved in the third world is disgraceful.

But this is not black and white. Coming back to the OP I think Tommy's shoudl do what it can, however it can to reduce the number of babies that die during pregnancy. That's what they were designed to do. Not promote BF or FF

Don't get me wrong hilda, I too have had a miscarriage (twins) and have previously supported charities like Tommy's - but I would not want the health and well-being of live babies to be jeopardised by inappropriate sponsorship and funding that causes a further decline in breastfeeding rates.

Aptamil - the brand most recommended by midwives to be superior to the others.

mmmmmmmmmmmmmm

and they say that advertising doesn't work.....

Why does it matter where Tommys gets its money from...its used in the right way.

Also get off your high horses about FF.
We do not live in the middle ages and we should all be grateful for these aids in life. You wanna breastfeed, go for it, just stop to think how you make women who want to but can't feel when BF fascists start all this bull.
Ever felt like a complete failure to your tiny child because there is something so natural that you cannot provide? Well, it really helps to have some sanctimonious b*tch going on about it!

The money is there and it's nobody else's damn business how you provide the best for your child!

Well as we all know all formula manufacturers are evil.

only took 20 posts to get 'fascist' and way-hey! we also got 'bitch' thrown in for good measure!

seriously, Careercarer, this is not about you, or your friends and family. this is not even anti formula. this is about a company which is knowingly breaking the WHO infant feeding code by courting a charity like Tommy's.

It knows that to behave ethically, it should not sponsor training days for health care provider who comes into contact with pregnant or new mothers.

I would like to know if midwives will be informed that artificial feeding is one of the leading causes of death in premature babies. Or will Aptamil give a nod to breastfeeding and then told of the miracle formula feeds which can be combined with breastfeeding (natch) to support premature baby's development.

I am not a betting woman but I would be willing to bet on this on.

£20,000. Is that it? Danone, the owner of Numico, the owner of Aptimil and Cow & Gate ahould should cough up a lot more than this for all the bollocks touted about formula being 'closest to breastmilk'. These LCPs or LCPAs are in breastmilk and are important as they are literally the building blocks of the brain and eyes etc. Anyway, the EFSA (European Foods Standards Agency) has not approved the claim that the LCPs that the company uses are of any use whatsoever to the infant. On the contrary, allegedly, there were even unexpected deaths of infants being fed these products. The idea that this product is somehow 'medicine' for infants is almost obscene. It seems it is quite the opposite. Food maybe, but medicine? Please explain to me how? Anyway, Danone has 14% of an over $2 billion dollar market. £20000 is just not enough IMO.

'their formula'

careercarer, i do not know your situation and your infant feeding choices but you clearly have some anger about this subject

it is well known that more formula advertising reduces bf rates, and increases a culture of ff being the norm. that means fewer people have the knowledge, skills and determination to help mothers who want to bf but are having difficulties.

Who are you calling bitches and fascists? Volunteers who give up their free time to do years of training, hours on a helpline and running baby cafes? Or mothers who have themselves perhaps found bf difficult, or wonderful, or both, and want to encourage others to succeed to bf in our ff dominated culture. these do not sound unpleasant people to me.

Aptimil are not interested in giving mothers a choice how to feed their baby, or giving accurate information, they want to sell as much formula as possible to make as much money as possible, and if, for example more prem babies die as a result of necrotising enterocolitis then do you think they care? Tommy's charity should, and they should not be associated with them.

and lastly of course it matters who they get money from. what if it were a cigarette manufacturer, or a land-mine company, or a cash donation from a drugs dealer, is that OK?

and
If Tommys were recieving money for their research from aptimel i would not mind.
I do mind that for whatever reason aptimils logo appears on their website. This is surely promotion of formula?

And i do care that aptimil appear to be funding hcps and taking a controling stake in the dissemination of information.

It's wrong.