Help Restrict the Promotion of Formula milk - Send Email to FSA before May 5th

[Pidge]

This is from the Breastfeeding Manifesto Coalition ....

How a baby is fed has profound health implications for both mother and child. It is very important that all parents, those who use formula and who breastfeed, have access to reliable information based on evidence that is free from commercial pressure. Only when this happens will parents be able to make a fully informed decision about how they want to feed their child.

In the UK however, weak laws mean that formula advertising and promotion far outweighs good quality information on feeding. The result of this is that formula feeding mothers find it hard to access reliable information to understand the facts about the various products, including safe preparation and storage of formula milk.,

To improve protection for parents and babies the Breastfeeding Manifesto Coalition is calling for the WHO Code of Marketing of Breastmilk substitutes and subsequent resolutions to become the Law in the UK (Objective 7 of the Manifesto). This is something we are committed to, but it can't happen overnight.

However, we do have an opportunity NOW to help move UK legislation in the right direction and strengthen the legislation governing baby milk promotion in the UK. The Food Standards Agency is consulting until February 5th on the new Guidance which the formula milk advertising must follow when promoting, labeling and advertising formula milk.

Please send the email below and play your part in helping to ensure that the new Regulations are as strong and robust as possible. Public pressure makes a real difference so make your voice heard!

www.breastfeedingmanifesto.org.uk/make_your_voice_heard_2.php/

Didnt say shed done her research just said in her opinion it was the best one because DS was very pukey so Omnio Comfort was best for sicky babies. Also he was born with bad eczema and apparently certain milk can set it off. I dont know its the one I used and the one I stuck with!

Squalor, correct. I value the 'experienced' midwife who says 'I cannot tell you what is best as there is no independent comparisons between brands, nor any long-term research to look at the outcomes of different brands on infant health. Choose whichever brand you want, and if you want to stick with one brand, and you don't have to, choose one which is easily available in shops near to where you live.'

The 'experienced' midwife knows she is being advertised to, and marketed to, when she opens her journal and sees a double page ad with virtually no good information in it at all, and goes to a conference and is offered a fluffy toy or a bar of chocolate or some trashy dingle-dangle with a brand name on it.

Any midwife who comes out with a brand name and recommends it to mothers is merely showing how little she knows, in fact!

Sent. I think it is important that formula is not able to covertly use product and logo placement to advertise their products.

Personally I feel that the companies are profit driven organisations. And so their primary target market is to try to get women to formula feed, not try to poach an sma mum from Aptimil.

In the end the formula companies are about making money, not altruistically helping women feed their children when they can?t bf and so we need to sift what they say. Of course formula is an important option for some women and we (as women) need it at times.

Not read through all the posts (got to dash) so sorry if repeating.

Tell u what if I have another child which I seriously doubt I shall just leave it in a big hole to starve rather than give it 'THE SPAWN OF SATAN' to help it live.

How dare I feed my child from a bottle!!!

Tell u what if I have another child which I seriously doubt I shall just leave it in a big hole to starve rather than give it 'THE SPAWN OF SATAN' to help it live.

How dare I feed my child from a bottle!!!

Oops didnt mean to double post LOL

ohh, no, no, no, youngbutnotdumb, dont even bother trying to have a discussion with the bf mafia, not worth it, ff= uneducated ill-informed as far as they are concerned.

walk away from the thread while you still can, dont let them drag you in, been there done that.

YBND, no-one is saying formula is bad, just that the compnies behind it do not make it easy to compare them properly, nor do they be completely honest about them.

Formula milk is a product made to gain profit, sad but true, and those companies will do anything they can to increase profit, they aren't interested in what effect the ingredients has on a babies gut, for example, just on how they can make it seem the best formula on the market.

They are preying on new mothers confusion and desire to do the best for their children in order to make money from it.

It's not FFing that is the issue, but how little true information we are given and the way these companies make the milk to seem better rather than be better.

Oh FFS....YBND and cola, you give formula, and guess what, this issue is nothing to do with you and your feeding experiences. You are not at the centre of this, believe it or not. Stop being so 'me me me'

Formula is a product that is legal and freely available, and that is fine. No one here argues against that.

You may not care about unethical marketing, but plenty of other people see this as an important public health issue for all parents and their babies.

You may not want to base your infant feeding choices on anything but what an 'experienced' midwife tells you. OK. Other people look at ads. Don't they and their babies deserve better than this?

Gosh, really didn't want to start a fight here. Just do believe that formula shouldn't be advertised, it should be clear to vulnerable mums that any formula is as good as any other. It doesn't make sense to allow them to advertise and imply their product is better because of what it contains.

And midwives/health visitors who imply that one brand is somehow better than another are perhaps the best proof that the marketing by these companies has worked.

Pidge, you didn't start a fight, as all too often happens on these threads someone comes along that feels the need to justify the fact that they formula fed and to complain that the 'breastfeeding mafia' are actually trying to make things better for, guess who?
FORMULA FEEDING PARENTS FFS.

I don't know how many times I have to say that I BF'd DS1 and am BFing DS2, DD was FF and I'm disgusted that formula is marketed the way it is, purely for profit and feel that mothers who decide to FF (which obviously isn't me anymore) deserve better than adverts designed by peopel trying to SELL a product rather than the real facts from someone unbiased.

These threads regarding decent elgislation around formula milk are for the benefit of mothers using formula, not mothers that are breastfeeding FGS.

I thought formula wasn't allowed to be advertised. I have seen adverts for "follow on" milks for babies from 6 months but never the sort suitable from birth. Am I wrong?

Ha tik tok, calm down, I did not say me, me, me, you are the me, me, me on these threads are you not?

I clearly told ybnd to walk away, thats all, as I will do now!

No, you're right, but they use the follow-on adverts as a platform to advertise their formulas and often even make the adverts look like baby is younger than 6 months -think SMA's advert showing Dad doing night feeds- so they still advertise formula just get round it by claiming it's ok as it has a small disclaimer saying it's suitable from 6 months.
This is the issue in question now.

Sorry I won't be signing. As a formula feeding mother I've never had any problems what so ever with accessing information.

How patronising, we're all well aware of the facts and as you don't need a degree in physics in order to store and prepare milk we're all well aware how to make and store bottles too.

Like most other mums who ff I made the decision totally 100% myself. I take offense when it's suggested that I would bow down to "commercial pressure" on such an important subject. Do you think I liked the look of the pretty tin then switched? Errr it doesn't actually work like that.

Buying formula is such a cloak and dagger exercise as it is, this will only make it worse. My sister just had to switch, she had no idea which one to choose and no idea that you could buy ready measured dried formula in sachets which as a twin mum would make her life 10 times easier. No, more advertising is needed for us the people that use it not less. If you don't like it turn the page.

MilaMae, unfortunately it isn't true that we all know how to prepare formula correctly as the many threads on here testify. Even the manufacturers don't know how to prepare it correctly, given the misinformation on their packaging.

So, you're never, ever influenced by advertising, at all?

MM, from where did you get your information about formula?
how did you find out about the constituents of formula, and how the different brands compare for example?
how did you find out about the risks of ff? are you happy that you received unbiased and useful information about the health risks of ff for your baby?
did this information influence your decision about ff?

Plus it's pretty impossible to be 'aware of the facts' when it comes to formula milk.
Especially what is in it, and which ones are betetr for our specific child, because....the formula companies won't give out the information! so where are you getting it from?

just over on one of the other threads right now about making up formula is evidence of people who don't know...

I rewrote the text as I think too many emails with the same text might get ignored as it is so clearly a campaign. This was mine.

I have been struck by the recent spate of adverts for follow-on formula. These serve to create an environment in which the default way that babies are fed is by formula. If there was equivalent spending on advertising breast feeding on television, they would be less damaging but there is no hope of such a thing.

I think the best way to promote breast feeding is simply to ban formula advertising. I breast fed my daughter but topped up with some formula. I found no difficulty accessing information about formula and I do not think that advertising it is necessary, even for those, like me, who used it to an extent.

Moving our society to a primarily breast feeding one is a major public health issue and we cannot achieve it while formula is being advertised so attractively.

Yours sincerely,

Guidelines have recently changed until then we all knew exactly how to make up bottles. If in doubt now talk to your midwife or hv, not that difficult really.

No, where important decisions regarding the wellbeing of my dc are concerned I'm never influenced by advertising, certainly not how I fed them at 6 weeks of age

it is not just about you, though, MilaMae, is it?
it is about the influence of formula promotion on midwives, HVs, other mothers, including those who are perhaps not as well educated or savvy as you.

Pro BF, e mail sent.

Perhaps you weren't MM, but where did you get the information from? Your midwife or HV? Your friends? Are you equally confident the general culture of normalising FF includes people as well informed as you?