Please change this image

[Porthia]

It’s pretty well documented that the way to get your baby the best gut start is via breastfeeding. This image makes it look like bottle feeding is the answer which is irresponsible.

Of all the known and/or suggested benefits of breastfeeding, its protective effects on infant gut health is the one which is most significant and conclusively proven.

It's like illustrating an article on how to protect your child's teeth with a photo of a child with a big glass of orange juice - yes it's common and sometimes unavoidable but if your focus is gut health a formula fed baby is already starting from a suboptimal situation.

Gestapo?

What next? The "sleep in your room for 6 months McCarthy Commission", "The low sugar Khmer Rouge", "The Rear Facing Car seat Taliban"?

We all know this.

However there are people who cannot breast feed, and they need the information on bottle feeding , not to feel like they are bad mothers

People aren't born knowing everything. Very difficult to promote a public health saying "X is best option" without implying that "not-X is a worse option".

You forgot the cloth bum KGB

BF is best, by far. Yes some can't, but many choose not to or don't know this, so it shouldn't be promoted. Also you may not know, but Western countries have marketed formula feeding as better to other developing countries to people who don't know any better. Quite disgusting really.

@Nicecow

Again, SOME women CANNOT

FED is best

Hello

Thanks for sharing thoughts on the use of this image here. Sorry it's taken us a while to get back to you.

While we look into this, there also look to be a couple of other issues raised in this thread. To help with those, can you tell us where you are seeing the image? I think it's likely the carousel on the homepage but it would be good to check.

Some of you are seeing it flagged as an ad and others aren't. If you are able to send screenshots including what device you are using and how you are accessing the site (app, desktop etc) that would also be really useful.

Thank you.

Bottle feeding is not the way to give your baby a good gut start, breastfeeding is. Formula for newborns isnt allowed to be advertised, that's why you get those nonsense follow on milk adverts. It looks as though this advert is saying bottle feeding is the way to good gut health, it should be an image of a women breastfeeding if you want to promote good gut health in babies.

The bottle is best brigade will not accept that some people literally have no choice but to bottle feed

Hi everyone,

Just to come back to this, we do take your point about the juxtaposition of the language 'how to give your baby a good gut start' with a bottle fed baby. As we all know, breast is best but at MN we've long recognised that some simply can't breastfeed and that many people use bottles to express milk with. We intentionally have a bottle in our angels logo (pic attached) to try to be inclusive of all mothers and their choices. In this instance maybe it was the wrong choice of image though because of the headline next to the pic so we'll swap it out in due course.

Many thanks for raising it.

this post is pathetic.
mothers can think for themselves.
so fking judgemental op do u know what people like u do to mothers that cannot for any reason not
breastfeed?? fk with their heads and make them feel like shit unworthy mothers that's what folk like u do.
poor bottle fed baby offending u, like i said, pathetic.

Approximately 5% of all women ever to give birth cannot breastfeed.

Many many more choose for various and valid reasons not to, or to give up earlier than the WHO recommendations.

Given that 60% of UK women do not breastfeed = 55% of all bottle feeding mothers have actively made a choice unconnected to anything physical- which is also their prerogative.

The problem lies with women who have been led to believe that they can't. And there is no real way of knowing how many of that 55% lie in that category.

But parenting websites showing ads with bottle feeding and blurb from "experts" about all those extra things babies need isn't going to help.

Plus I also think HQ need legal advice as per pp as afaik, promoting bottle feeding and extras in this way is against the law. Which is why the advertising of "follow on milk" is the only mass produced infant milk to be legally advertised.

Actually pet, breast feeding was the answer for my 3rd child. Would you have preferred that i breast fed ( just like i did with my first 2) and passed the medication that i needed to take but would kill my baby through my breast milk ? Stop clutching your self righteous pearls.

Finally a voice of reason!

Get a grip!

I’m not offended at this 1 bit. Either breast feed or bottle feed, entirely up to you. Hardly think a picture & a caption would change someone’s mind!

This advert doesn’t say it’s best, it promotes it as good. Which is ok, it’s good for some mums/babies.

Let people choose for themselves.

It's people like you that made me feel such an utter failure as a mother as I couldn't breastfeed, something that obviously still upsets me years later, cheers for that

Take absolutely no notice at all. Your baby was fed, you’re a great Mum!

Imagine being inclusive and catering to the folk that couldn't breast feed for reasons they don't need to disclose or just didn't want to.
Lots of breast is best information.
Does anyone consider how society portrays women who can't feed or choose not to feed? It's not good. Infact it's horrendous. Then you've got the dont breast feed in public crew berating women for getting their breast out in a manner that's deemed to be in appropriate.
Can't do right for doing wrong.

I suggest anyone who is asking why this is an issue read The Politics of Breastfeedinf by Gabrielle Palmer and / or Breastfeeding Uncovered by Prof Amy Brown.

There is a reason why it’s illegal to market baby formula.

This is not about judging or shaming families for feeding their babies in any way that works for them. It’s about ensuring that as many as possible have the the information and support that they need - without companies making an enormous profit from those choices.

If you formula fed your baby please don’t feel bad about this. Whether you chose to do so straight off the bat or because you struggled with breastfeeding. No one should make you feel bad for that and it wasn’t my intention. However, I strongly believe that should be a personal decision for any individual family alone and that all women should have maximum support and information to make whichever choice they want - and the support in this country in general is sorely lacking. Which is one of the reasons why we have the worst rates of breastfeeding in the entire world. I also strongly believe that absolutely no one else should have a vested interest in this decision eg multibillion pound companies making a profit from selling formula and associated products. Small, insidious things like the placing of the photo in question next to that headline as part of an advert all contribute to that picture. It didn’t have to be a breastfeeding picture either - just a random picture of a baby would have been totally fine!

Also, to be clear, I’m not saying there should never be photos of a baby being bottle fed. That’s also fine, of course! It was just the juxtaposition with this particular headline!

But in limiting images of bottle feeding, it's not ridding it of a vested interest of promoting women to breast feed?

We're not talking about equalising representation it's more about limiting exposure because women's decision not to breast feed isn't what other people think should be happening