Join the campaigns to BF in Public and stop Formula advertising!!!!!!

[Difers]

I got this e-mail today and thought that some of you may be interested in supporting these campaigns

Dear Friend,

We have a short, but important window of opportunity to influence policy and implement two of the Breastfeeding Manifesto?s objectives. As a supporter of The Breastfeeding Manifesto I am writing to ask for your urgent help to influence two important proposed laws which could see the implementation of objective 5 and 7 of the Manifesto- if you act now. Visit www.breastfeedingmanifesto.org.uk and send the emails to the government ministers on the ?How You Can Help? page. It?s quick and easy!

Objective 5-Breastfeeding in public

Objective 5 of the Manifesto is: ?Develop policy and practice to support breastfeeding in public places.? The UK government has released The Single Equality Bill for consultation. This means that everyone including organizations and members of the public can submit their comments on this proposed new law. The Single Equality Bill covers a range of issues but one of its aims is to stop the discrimination against breastfeeding mothers in public. We are delighted that the government is finally addressing this issue. However, we feel that the bill as it currently stand is worrying; it only provides protection for those mothers who are breastfeeding a child up to the age of 12 months. By only protecting Mothers breastfeeding children under the age of 12 months the UK government is sending out a message that it is unacceptable to breastfeed a child over the age of one and therefore suggesting it is acceptable to discriminate against them. The World Health Organization recommends that babies are breastfed for two years or beyond and so we believe that the cap on 12 months could be damaging to children?s health. We need you to send the email at the bottom of this pagewww.breastfeedingmanifesto.org.uk/make_your_voice_heard_1.php to ask the government to change the proposed law to ensure all women are fully protected to feed their babies in public beyond their first birthday.

Objective 7- Advertising of Formula Milk

Objective 7 of the Manifesto is: ?Adopt the World Health Organization International Code of Marketing of Breast Milk Substitutes and subsequent relevant Resolutions.? The Food Standards Agency is currently consulting regulations for the advertising and promotion of formula milk. You may have read the recent press coverage and out cry surrounding OK, the model Jordan and SMA formula milk. It is this kind of promotion which we want to stop. However the proposed regulations would not cover this kind of promotion and so the regulations are inadequate for protecting parents and babies from the influence of formula-milk promotion. Parents need reliable information based on evidence, not commercial pressure from baby milk companies. Non commerical, independent information will benefit all parents including those who bottle feed. However, the proposed regulations are inadequate for the job of protecting parents and babies from the influence of formula promotion. Objective 7 of the Manifesto calls for the implementation of The WHO Code on the Marketing of Breast Milk Substitutes and it provides an excellent model for the law that is required. We need you to send the email at www.breastfeedingmanifesto.org.uk/make_your_voice_heard_2.php asking the Foood Standards Agenncy to go further than they propose to go.

It is only with your help and when we work together that we will be be able to influence the government and have lasting affect on children?s health.

I urge you to please visit this website and send the emails, your voice really matters.

Best Wishes

Alison Baum

Co-Founder and Spokesperson, The Breastfeeding Manifesto Coalition

Hunker writes (God you lot are gonna be peed off with me again...!):

If we spend forever arguing about the most important thing we can do to protect the choice to bf and make sure women are supported to make the right decision for them and their families, we'll never actually do anything.

There are lots of things we can do to make these things happen. One doesn't take precedence over the other, and (and this is revolutionary thinking...!) they can be done at the same time.

So we can work towards banning formula advertising * and better support for new mums and better legislation for mums who would like to bfeed in public * and free chocolate cake in hospitals for every nursing mother, if you like. It's all possible.

You just have to open your minds. But not too far. Your brain will fall out.

i agree there's a danger of arguing for ever and nothing getting done. But honestly, fighting the formula companies is fighting a losing battle, IMO (I'm not talking about the developing world here, a very different issue). There's a need to prioritise here and IMO, decent support should be top priority and then further down the line look at issues such as the right to bf after 1 yr.

oh and my brain probably is about to fall outnow. Probably after all those yrs of bfing...

(PBH) But you can't get decent support for women given by HCPs who are still being fed the line that formula's pretty much the same as breastmilk.

And they are fed that line all the time. And they then pass it on to the women they're meant to be supporting.

Hence my stance on formula advertising being an absolute, immovable no-no.

Too right, hunker-in-disguise....we can work on it all, and in fact, this is the only way any of it is gonna work.

It's no use working on training and support and help for new mothers if (for example) their partner sees that awful ad for SMA on the tele insinuating that the lovliest dads are the ones who give formula.

It's no use increasing the number of breastfeeding support groups if there's a mum who's feeling too wobbly and shy to come to them, in case her baby needs feeding when she's there.

It's no use increasing the quality of information to mothers who formula feed if when they come to choose their brand from the shelf they see the confusing and contradictory health claims and slogans.

Where are people getting this mad idea that advertising has anything to do with information??

If you want to find out about a food product, say a pasta sauce, would you seek out the advert or would you read the ingrediant list and check out the manufacturing process?

If you go by the 'information' that is in the advert chances are you will see a sauce made by lovely good looking Italian family in homey kitchen after having handpicked tomatoes from hillside out the back of dream villa in Tuscany. Smashing!

The reality is more likely to be mass production line in industrial zone in Eastern Europe, workers in white coats and hairnets, tomatoes arriving in truckloads and various drums of additives kicking about.

I think it is scandalous the difficulty we have obtaining impartial information about formula. Surely this is something that we can all agree on no matter how we end up feeding our babies.

I am totally convinced that banning formula advertising is not an attack on formula feeding but def a way of helping increase breastfeeding rates and acceptance.
I lived in Sweden for a year where such advertising is banned and breastfeeding is very common. Women breastfeed anywhere and everywhere and no one bats an eyelid.
It is very much the norm there and as such women rarely feel uncomfortable feeding out and about.
I am breastffeding DS2 (and fed DS1 till he was 2) but I DO feel uncomfortable feeding him in public (and I am very discreet). Where I live its unusual to see women breastfeeding in public and this is a sad state of affairs.

exactly the point I was making pannacotta ooh I love that desert

i really never have seen an advert for formula, i don't read magazines and i don't think you will find a formula ad in the Times, i only know about sma, and thats because thats what my friend bottle fed her baby.

and i know midwives cant advise because the woman whose conversation i was earwigging on said that she asked the midwife for some scissors to open her carton of ready made formula and they said no because "we are not allowed to promote bottlefeeding" so the woman had to phone her husband to bring in some scissors. i couldn't believe what i was hearing. i couldn't care less if they ban adverts on tv and in magazines but i want my midwife or hv to be able to give me advice on formula without a lecture or brushing me off.

Joopie, if that is what has happened, then that midwife was very very wrong...and I think got the wrong end of the stick, as they say.
However, there is of course a chance that that woman was over exaggerating or misunderstood, and things get often misconstrued when people feel a bit defensive about what they are doing.
Not saying you misheard, by the way, just it's hard to judge things like that by pure hearsay, without knowing the person and the situation, etc...!
But indeed if that has happened that way, then it would be very bad, and would not help to promote anything but bad feeling.
Also, of course first milks aren't allowed to be advertised for a fair while, well, not directly anyway....however, that is why Formula companies invented Follow on milks....and that is the sole reason, because there was a loop in the law, that says that that kind of milk can be promoted...doesn't that tell us something...again it only highlights just how clever the companies are and that they indeed feel it's very very very important to their sales to advertise...!

Previous people have said so much better what I had try to say there earlier....nothing new there then...thank got other people have a better way with words.

joopie, you are describing poor postnatal care with the story about the scissors and the carton - this is one very stupid midwife, if the conversation you overheard was correct.

No one should brush you off or give you a lecture . Again, this would be poor postnatal care - totally different subject to advertising of formula.

How does permitting advertising of formula lead to better postnatal care????

The quality press in the UK certainly does take ads for formula - there was a whole series of sponsored features in the Independent a couple of years ago, backed by Milupa, and dealing with various child care topics.

You may see TV ads for formula occasionally, even if you don't read magazines.

You may not even be aware of them - and individuals may not be influenced directly, but the population certainly is.

i really don't care if they ban formula ads, i don't buy my washing powder or anything else from being influenced by adverts, adverts breaks are for getting snacks and a cup of tea!

i hope you are right about it being bad post natal care, maybe it was that the midwife had very strong views about formula.
but as this is my first baby i have no idea about how much milk to give a baby, how to prepare it, how often to feed, how to properly sterilise, the different types of teat, when would i use a fast flow teat? i just want to be sure that i will get unbiased help and advice from the professionals, just like breast feeders want help and advice.

I hope you get what you want, joopie - you should, as you say, get the same support and information as anyone else.

It may not be unbiased - midwives and health visitors are not well-trained in infant feeding, on the whole, and there is no good source of independent info about the different formulas. You may find someone recommends a brand, but it may not be on the basis of good evidence.

They should be able to help with info about teats, quantities and how to make up the powder, though.

Joopie, from my days when I fed Formula to es, especially, I remember that all teh info and feeding guides and even sterilising guidelines were contained on the Formula packets.
Teatsize is another matter...but hey, that sort of thing is what mumsnet and other forums are for...often you get much better advice on forums anyway

Unfortunately, the instructions on making up formula feeds on the package are not in line with current guidance on safety see here

well, that is pretty bad then....tiktok...surely it would be in their own interest to give at least here correct info....[shaking my head at FF companies evne more than usual emoticon]

no tictok it didnt i used sma as did my mum for me and my brothers because she suffered the same problem as me. so my choice was already made.

I am VERY PRO-BF and believe every woman should at least TRY it BUT I do think that banning formula advertising may not be the answer.

TBH, I have only ever seen 1 TV ad for follow-on milk and a couple spreads ever in my life. Guess, some may argue that I won't miss it all then BUT making it contra-ban doesn't seem right.

Products that are usually banned from advertising or are restricted are ones like tobacco, alcohol, and junk food. I can see how adding formula to this list could make those who have to FF feel uncomfortable.

Why can't formula advertising be restricted and only be about the information. Maybe no more emotive ads allowed anymore? Just pure infomercial/advertorial type stuff gives the facts re the ingredients, how it works etc.

Well, that is what I think in my humble opinion.

Not at all in their own interests, 3and.

They have a vested interest in making formula feeding seem safe and straightforward, and not to challenge the habitual methods of preparing it....'cos this might put people off.

If they are upfront about the contamination risk (which is what lies behind the slightly more complex guidance to mix with water that's been cooled to 70 deg C and so on), it doesn't look good.

The confusion that's resulted from instructions that now differ from what's on the pack can be seen on mumsnet, with a long thread on bottles and whether one should make them up individually, how to store if not, what risks there might be in avoiding the new guidance and so on.

IMO you cannot decide to be liberal on one count and not another. So, yes to BF in public and yes to allow formula advertising for me.
I don't know any woman who thinks that FF is better than BF. So allow the advertising but improve the support for new mothers who are trying to BF because it seems that that is the reason for the low rates in this country.
If I end up FF after failing at BF and I see some advertising at least i will know the names of a few manufacturers and i can then go away and do my research. I am sure we are all able to see past the advertising headlines- after all we do with everything else!

but els, that would take the very essence of ads away, wouldnt it.....I mean, that is what advertising is about.

In the end, banning FF ads and creating a law to protect bf'ing mothers in public is only part of what needs to be done, but it would be a step in the right direction!

And sugar....you actually just demonstrated brand-loyalty , and how it's passed down through the generations....and there is a very good possibility that your mum was "exposed" to advertising and may well have based her choice on that, or partly on that, as well, as possibly the advice of a Health care proffessional who may well have been influenced by certain Formula Companies...

tiktok, put like that...yes...that makes sense...

suey....but advertising does NOT help the consumer....independent advice would help...

but i do not know the names of any manufacturers and frankly if i have a new baby, i will not be trawling the aisles of sainsburys reading the back of tins. I woudl ask the MW for a recommendation, but if she is not allowed to say- what am i supposed to do?
Advertising does provide information.

I am an expectant mother to be and i think that we should be allowed to breast feed openly in public - in europe it isn't frowned upon. i was digusted a few days ago when a mother in a cafe was being laughed at for mearly soothing and feeding her crying child. it is peoples attitudes that need to be changed. of course we all know 'bitty' in little britain but shorely a baby is different

Ok, guys, I do agree that the formula companies should be providing us information on their product not trying to subliminally undermine BF.

If they do NOT do it through the means of advertising how else will the information be distributed out?

Will a mother (or father) just be expected to read the back of several tins before the baby is born to decide what to use? Will there some independent website set up? Would that be allowed to be advertised? (like confused.com but for formula?)

I guess I am asking where people expect parents to go to for this information.