Guest post: “Formula milk companies are getting in the way of parents’ decisions”

[MumsnetGuestPosts]

#breastisbest, #fedisbest? Society seems intent on pitching mothers against each other, but there’s no need to take a side. Whether you breastfeed, bottle-feed, or mix-feed we know parents are simply doing their best. Working for Save the Children I see that first-hand from parents all over the world. Yet when it comes to feeding your baby, formula milk companies are getting in the way of parents’ decisions. They’re putting babies at risk by putting their profits first.

Last week Save the Children published Don’t Push It, revealing the scale of the formula milk industry’s aggressive marketing and calling on them to clean up their act. Six companies spend the equivalent of £36 on marketing for each baby born worldwide - amounting to £5 billion every year. Their marketing routinely violates a World Health Organisation code set up to stop aggressive marketing to new mums. Parents are bombarded with advertisements including false health claims and social media promotions, while doctors report receiving gifts and incentives to promote infant formula.

Why does this matter?

An estimated 823,000 child deaths would be prevented in low and middle-income countries each year if almost all babies were breastfed. That’s nearly one in seven of all deaths of children under the age of five, globally.

This is because breast milk is a baby’s first immunisation. It offers the antibodies a baby needs to survive lethal diseases like pneumonia, which kills more children under five than any other disease.

In situations where clean water isn’t available, mixing formula with dirty water can be dangerous and life-threatening. And when parents can’t afford enough product and have to dilute it, or don’t have access to safe preparation instructions, babies’ lives are also at risk.

What about mums who can’t breastfeed?

Our report does not deny that formula milk has a positive role to play in the right conditions. There is a recognised medical need for some infants to be formula-fed, and for several reasons it is a decision made by parents around the world.

We found that even where mums want to breastfeed they face pressure to choose formula. In Yangon, Myanmar we met La Min and her daughter San Sundari. She told us that she thought it wouldn’t be a problem if she didn’t breastfeed, because she could afford to buy formula. She made this decision after being told by the nurse that helped deliver her daughter that it would improve her baby’s IQ. So pervasive is the belief that artificial breast milk substitutes are better than the real thing in Myanmar’s healthcare system, that La Min even recalls doctors shouting at her when she decided to switch to breastfeeding instead.

What needs to change?

The time has come for companies to enter a race to the top to become the most ethical formula company, putting mothers’ and babies’ health as their priority and leading the way for others to follow suit.

We’re calling on:

• companies to publicly commit to upholding the code and agree to meet targets set to achieve full compliance
• investors of formula companies to consider their ethical investment policies and urge their formula companies to align with them
• governments to adopt the code into legislation, as the evidence is clear that legislation is the strongest motivator for these industry giants to play fair

All involved in this industry must put babies before profit.

Hannah Greer, a Campaigner from Save the Children's International Development department will be responding to questions and comments on this post later this week.

Photo credit: Chloe White/Save the Children

mamad there are plenty of organisations working on that (including Save the Children). However, while we wait for awesome hygiene, potable water for all and available fuel to boil everything for at least 3 minutes a more workable solution is to stop companies peddling their nonsense and undermining women who want to breastfeed.

I wouldn't like to be in Ghouta right now with a formula fed baby.

Don’t forget the free or cheap formula - formula that costs pennies and free fuel, because that’s all these women can afford.

Plus help with healthcare as their formula fed babies are still more likely to get infections because they’re not being breastfed, and you know, no NHS.

Plus money towards increased access to contraception as ff women are more fertile than their fully bf sisters. And maybe iron supplements for the mums as they are likely to be menstruating shortly after childbirth - not what nature intended for postpartum women.

Or maybe they could just be supported with breastfeeding and someone could stop formula companies from acting like cunts in poor countries.

Unethical marketing in the uk? Like what? We aren't allowed to make an informed choice about formula here because of fucking breast is best lactivist bullshit.

@minifingerz your post is so spot on. The op made it clear that this is about low and middle income countries, which don't have access to same levels of healthcare as we do. Therefore prevention bring better than a cure - it's obviously worthwhile to encourage breastfeeding in these nations.

I felt a lot of pressue to formula feed. From m/w, who cba to help with bf, so told me to just give formula, to the gp, who didn’t believe i was fully bf, to everyone and his dog who had an opinion on why i shouldn’t bf- not in public, i was stopping other people from having a relationship with my child because they couldn’t feed her, there’s no need past 6 weeks, i needed to know how much she was getting, the crying/waking at night/frequent feeding must be because my milk wasn’t good enough. Plus the you need to have a break crowd.

My mum genuinely believes breastfeeding is inferior. It’s unhygenic because there’s no sterilisation, you need to control amounts so you know the baby is getting enough, babies settle better/sleep through on formula so it must be better nutritionally.

Thegruffalosarse this lecture by the lady who runs first steps nutrition trust is a great example of very unethical formula marketing to health professionals in th U.K. people think formula is highly regulated here, it actually isn’t. I have to say my jaw dropped when I watched it.

Another example would be the marketing of unnecessary products, nightime milks/comfort milks/ hungry baby milks. There’s is no evidence to suggest any of these do a thing, as stated on the nhs webpage on those of formula. They are made up purely to get more £££ out of parents.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=9wRHoI1cMFM

I was pressured to breast feed and in no way pressured with formula. The pressure from hardened pro breastfeeding clinicians ruined my breastfeeding experience. If anything the nhs would not discuss formula and keeps it under lock and key in my local hospital like it some sort of poison. They won’t answer any questions on formula incase it looks like they’re advocating it. I think all options need to be discussed with new Mums as I believe fed is best.

Oh and I agree with a previous poster in that they need to make formula cheaper as new mothers whose can’t breastfeed are being penalised with extautional prices. Do the companies not make enough money? I’d o not believe it costs anywhere near what they charge to make formula.

who*

‘In the developing world where formula cannot be afforded or where keeping bottles sterile may be difficult breast feeding is obviously very important and it is shameful how companies push formula feeding there but in the UK it's really not such a bad option. It seems that in all of your attempts to encourage breastfeeding you've simply ostracized bottle feeding mothers who ARE doing their best.’

This ^

Starmix (talking only about countries where ff is safe) I think most people agree, that’s kind of the point. The only information we get about formula is from formula companies, which is normally not scientific at all but marketing to make money for the company. The truth is the nhs can’t really give out information other than the most obvious basics (make up feeds with boiling water/sterilising etc) because there is no information to give. Our FSA is already on the side of big business as the video I posted shows, so they are not impartial either. No other body unpicks this stuff, apart from a few charities but they are tiny have have very little power compared to the might of multinationals.

Rumpledfaceskin I understand NHS can only give out basics but they ruined my breastfeeding experience by placing unnecessary pressure on breastfeeding and refused to entertain formula even existed. The basics I needed explained as I was a new sleep deprived mother with a sick baby and had been through a traumatic birth yet they refused to answer any of my ‘basic’ questions. If as you say the only information we get is from formula companies (who are out to make profit) and the nhs can only give us limited information how do you propose this can be changed?

@thegruffalo

Spot on, in this country we are penalised if we choose not to breastfeed. The formula prices have nothing to do with the costs of advertising, and everything to do with the fact that promotional activity (i.e. vouchers, loyalty points, discounts) are not allowed because promotion of formula feeding over breastfeeding is banned. That irks me, because I have the right to choose not to breastfeed, and it's got fuck all to do with formula promotion. Now I've made this choice, I'm not allowed to benefit from any kind of discount or promotion on formula because they can't be seen to be promoting it. I know my options, I've made my choice, if others would be swayed by advertising then that's their own fault for not being logical enough to make decisions on their own.

hereyougosuckmyassforensics Exactly, it irks me too. It’s the Mother’s choice and both methods should be equally promoted and in my experience they were not.

I think we have to look at history here too...

In the uk in the 70’s ff was marketed as “superior” to breast milk. I believe that marketing has directly led to the prevalence of ff in this country- in one generation we have lost the knowledge and family support around bf- nearly all the “advice” i got from family was based on their own knowlege of ff- they told me baby couldn’t be getting enough if they weren’t going 4 hrs etc. I also know friends in their 20’s who do things like weetabix in the bottle because that’s what mum/aunt/nan advised.

None of my immediate relatives breastfed. Like pp their view was the marketing that told them that you don’t know that breastmilk has all the nutrients, that the baby is getting enough etc. Paired with the obsession with weighing and weight gain- the more weight gained the better, they pretty much tried to talk me out of bf because ff was more “certain” and you knew the baby was healthy. Rather than the blind fairh needed to trust breastmilk was doing it’s job.

This is how the countries in the article will end up. Losing the generational knowledge- we underestimate how much we rely on advice from family and female relatives. It took me a fairly strong will to be able to fend off all the advice and carry on bf- every comment on his weight gain (slow) or not sleeping through or crying a lot planted and helped that seed of doubt grow that my milk wasn’t doing it’s job, and if i switched to formula it would be one less thing to worry about..

Hello everyone,

I'm Hannah- a Campaigner at Save the Children.

Thanks for reading the blog and for your interesting comments and questions.

I'm going to respond to your questions now...

Hannah x

Some of you have asked why we've brought this to your attention and what you can do to help in the UK...

One of our main objectives of this report has been to raise the level of attention and concern about the issue. Many people think this was a problem from a few decades ago that was resolved at the time. On the contrary- the global market in baby formula is seeing a five-fold increase in two decades that far outstrips the world’s population growth. This is in part, due to formula companies circumventing the rules- rules that were designed to protect the most vulnerable mothers and babies.

We want to get people talking about the issue again, so that companies feel pressure from the public and from their consumers to follow the rules.

It would be great if you could spread the word by sharing the report with your networks via social media. You could also directly post to the companies. There are some suggested tweets/Facebook posts below:

1. Time’s up for formula milk companies putting children’s lives at risk. Put babies first and follow the rules, read the full Save The Children UK report here. #DontPushIt save.tc/oeoT30iCtE5

2. .@xxxcompany we’ve read the @savethechildrenuk report which shows how you’re breaking the code and putting children’s lives at risk. Will you publicly commit to upholding the Code in full? #DontPushIt save.tc/oeoT30iCtE5

3. Millions of children are at risk from the rapid growth of the baby milk formula market. I’m calling on the industry to show their commitment to safeguarding children’s health and comply with the @WHO Code in full. #DontPushIt save.tc/oeoT30iCtE5

Company twitter handles:

@nestle
@danone
@abbottglobal
@kraftheinzco
@FrieslndCampina
@discoverRB

Thanks for your support.

Hannah

@bananasandwichcake

A question for Save the Children:

Is it possible to name and shame the worst offenders? Are there any formula milk companies that have some morals and aren't doing this?

A campaign to switch from one formula to another would be very powerful.

Hi there,

Unfortunately, we're not aware of any formula companies following the Code in its entirety.

However, to help inform your choices, we'd recommend reading the information gathered by First Steps Nutrition on formula brands available in the UK:

www.firststepsnutrition.org/newpages/Infant_Milks/infant_milks.html

Best wishes,

Hannah

Some of you have mentioned feeling pressured to breastfeed and others being pressured to formula feed. This is really sad to read about.

Save the Children advocates for parents to receive non-biased, factual information about infant feeding. We know parents just want to do right by their children, and that's why we're keen to stop the aggressive marketing by formula companies, because they often don't have the interests of children at heart.

Our report contains lots of examples where companies have broken the rules, for example, by putting non-scientific, misleading claims on their labels, such as suggesting their product gives babies a higher IQ. There are other examples where they have bribed healthcare workers with holidays and gifts to promote their products.

These tactics get in the way of parents receiving factual information, and in some settings means they choose formula when they don't need it or can't afford it. Mothers we interviewed in the Philippines spent over 3/4 of their income on formula, and spoke of forgoing food themselves as a result. And the health care professionals we spoke to said formula company representatives were a 'constant presence' in their clinics.

We simply want formula companies to comply with the existing, long-established rules- putting mothers and babies before their bottom line.

I've been boycotting Nestle now for 20+ years. It is so depressing that this is still an issue, but it's equally depressing that in 20+ years we still don't have decent access to drinking water in developing countries and that in many countries women are still diluting expensive formula in preference to breast feeding which would give their babies more advantages.

What else can non-formula feeders do to promote this though? cow and Gate won't give a mnokey's what I think as I don't buy their products.

I feel like a complete knob for not knowing about this until fairly recently when I discovered baby milk action by accident. I will be boycotting. I’m not sure what else we can do apart from support the charities who are working to hold companies to account. And volunteer locally to support breastfeeding support groups maybe. Because whether we like it or not the obvious way to get more people to boycott these companies is helping more people to bf.

It’s pretty shit that ff parents don’t really have a choice but to support these companies. I’ve never heard of smaller ethical formula companies.

‘It’s pretty shit that ff parents don’t really have a choice but to support these companies’

Some people choose to formula feed over breastfeeding in UK. They do have a choice and choose to buy formula.

It’s not always medical need. My friend chose to formula feed from the start because she didn’t want to breastfeed.

Yes I’m aware of that. I would assume that most people wouldn’t freely chose to support a multimillion £ company that’s responsible for the deaths and ill health of infants in other countries though, if there were other companies to buy from.

Yes they would but there aren’t other ethical formula companies are there?