'Breastfeeding not as beneficial as once thought'

[Jojay]

See this link.

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

(hope the link works)

Comments??

Belarus, even (am feeding dd and making biscuits at the same time, brian overload)

Think there was a similar-ish study in Germany a year or so ago. Will try to find link.

Agree that will be misinterpreted as 'breastfeeding isn't good after all' which is NOT what anyone is arguing

here it is

Well durr!!!!

Breastfeeding is the 'natural' thing. Thus:

Breastfeeding doesnt have 'benefits' as such. Formula feeding has 'risks'. It's slightly different.

Asthma is usually a genetic thing. However, there are things that can increase the likelihood of it being triggered.

But here ( )( ) give my norks a bash if it makes you feel better

Breastfeeding is normal. It doesn't have advantages.

We speak of it as having 'benefits' instead of saying the opposite which is more accurate: that ff has risks.

there is a wonderful article available on the net about this not so revolutionary or original idea.

well worth a read but at work now and don't have time to search for it.

Here you go, full paper cut and pasted (have cut out some of the credits to reduce length). Seems to show b/f has no protective effect against exzema. Clearly this does not in any way outweight the countless studies demonstrating the many beneficial effects of b/f - merely suggests may not protect against eczema, particularly (I think) in families predisposed to eczema.

_
BMJ, doi:10.1136/bmj.39304.464016.AE (published 11 September 2007)
Research

Effect of prolonged and exclusive breast feeding on risk of allergy and asthma: cluster randomised trial

Correspondence to: M S Kramer, Montreal Children's Hospital, 2300 Tupper Street (Les Tourelles), Montreal, Quebec H3H 1P3 [email protected]

Abstract

Objective To assess whether exclusive and prolonged breast feeding reduces the risk of childhood asthma and allergy by age 6.5 years.
Design Cluster randomised trial.

Setting 31 Belarussian maternity hospitals and their affiliated polyclinics.

Participants A total of 17 046 mother-infant pairs were enrolled, of whom 13 889 (81.5%) were followed up at age 6.5 years.

Intervention Breastfeeding promotion intervention modelled on the WHO/UNICEF baby friendly hospital initiative.

Main outcome measures International study of asthma and allergies in childhood (ISAAC) questionnaire and skin prick tests of five inhalant antigens.

Results The experimental intervention led to a large increase in exclusive breast feeding at 3 months (44.3% v 6.4%; P

Scroll down to 'discussion' and 'what this study adds' for the main points.

here and here - the links i was talking about earlier!!

so exclcusive breastfeeding in the breastfeeding group was 7.9% [as opposed to 0.6%] at 6 months! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.

IMHO people who have a family history of allergies have often posted anecdotally that in their experience, b/f hasn't had the prophylactic effect that was suggested to them by midwives and other health professionals.

Ruty put it well..... "no surprise there, breastfeeding doesn't change your genes"

Because of this fact I have always said that for me the jury was still out on this one so in a way I'm not surprised at the results.

Before I'm jumped on for this opinion, please remember that I'm not talking about any other health benefits claims that are made about breastfeeding, only the allergies one.

i honestly think the jury is still out, especially as exclusive breastfeeding rates were so low in both comparative groups.

Hmm, I do know one girl whose eldest ds suffered from dreadful exzema. She ff him but was advised to bf any subsequent children. She did and none of them suffered from exzema at all. Or that could have been just luck!

well VVV and kiskidee said that so much better than I could...so, what they said

I guess if you are cursed, you're cursed.

Dh's family have produced a large number of children with various "shades" of eczema - all of them bf bar my ds1 who was ff and had the mildest eczema of the lot (and the least food allergies). Genes can be a bummer.

I wonder how they worked out how much of a difference the intervention made?

Did they simply ask the mothers if they were doing what the interventionists had told them was best for baby?

hmm my experience is the opposite, i have asthma, eczma and hayefever, it runs in my family, dp has hayfever.

i have bfeed all three boys, exclusivley for the first 6mths for ds1 and the first 9mths for the second two.(ds1 bfed till 18mtsh, ds2 until he was 3 and a half, ds3 is still bfeeding at 2 and a half) i was also VERY careful when weaning,no wheat or dairy till over one, infact in ds2 and ds3 they were more like 18mths when i introduced wheat etc.

NONE of the boys have asthma, eczma or hayfever, despite being told myd everal gp's and a paediatrician that it was "highly likely" given the severity of my allerigies and eczma ( i see a consultant dermatologist regularly, have intolerance to dairy and sevre allergies to pollen etc) that the boys would be affected in some way, however they lall have beautiful clear skin and are allergy free i do feel that the extended bfeeding combined with the careful weaning had a part to play in this.

just to add my bit

that's great 3madboys. I have asthma and hope that extended breastfeeding and careful weaning is going to help my ds avoid it.

upwind

by comparing bf rates in groups with and without intervention - some of the clinics didn't do bf promotion.

I don't understand how they measured bf rates for the study?

Did they incentivise the clinic to promote it and perhaps ask those same people to record the rates that were then reported by the mothers involved?

I was clumsily trying to insinuate that would be a flawed approach as the resulting numbers would possibly be biased.

have you read the paper?

It's not ethical to randomise mothers into ff or bf groups so they did it another way.

They looked at 31 hospitals and associated clinics and randomly assigned each one into one of two groups: an 'intervention' group, which would start a new bf promotion strategy (along the lines of the WHO/UNICEF baby friendly initiative) and a 'control' group, which would carry on with whatever they were doing before.

The clinics were not incentivised in any way.
The paeds who did the follow-up interviews weren't coaxing women to say they bfd longer than they did - they had nothing to gain.

The PROBIT study was actually done in 1996-7 and many papers have been published from it since then - its methods are pretty watertight as these things go.

Message withdrawn

I haven't read the paper, I admit.

However this study is done in 31 maternity hospitals in Belarus.

The population of Belarus is and will be reeling from the effects of Chernobyl for a few generations more.

• read: babies with compromised immune systems - mothers with compromised immune systems.

These environmental conditions are hardly representative of the world population at large. I hope anyway.

yes exaxtly kiskidee.