I APPLAUD Joanna Weiss’s Dec. 6 op-ed column “R.I.’s bottle ban.’’ Thank you for supporting all of the mothers out there who cannot or choose not to breast-feed for whatever reason. We are just as worthy of support as mothers who choose to breast-feed their babies. The “ban the bag’’ movement - where hospitals no longer include a sample-sized can of infant formula in its “pile of freebies’’ to new mothers - denies new mothers important educational materials and resources. It potentially risks the health of their infants, and does nothing to address the real barriers to increasing breast-feeding rates.
I hope Massachusetts hospitals will support all of the mothers who deliver babies in our Commonwealth, and will not follow Rhode Island’s disturbing action. Depending on the circumstances, many mothers both breast-feed and use infant formula at some point during their babies’ first year of life, and they overwhelmingly report that infant formula samples play little or no role in their decisions to breast-feed or not.
Ultimately, it is a mother’s decision how to feed her child, and she should be provided nonjudgmental, unbiased care, support, and resources. New mothers should not endure any stress caused by defending their choice of how to feed their babies.Hospitals shouldn’t have a hand in product marketing
RE “R.I.’s bottle ban’’ by Joanna Weiss (Op-ed, Dec. 6): We salute Rhode Island for becoming the first state to “Ban the Bags.’’ This public health decision is not dictated by the whim of crazed advocates bent on making new mothers feel guilty. It reflects two decades of medical evidence for optimal health outcomes.
Hospitals should not be involved in facilitating marketing of commercial products to their patients. Behind the cute and seemingly harmless diaper bag lies a sophisticated marketing campaign, not to protect women from guilt, but to sell more formula.
We feel for every mother out there who has experienced trouble with breast-feeding. Please hear that the problem is not you; the problem is the system and the culture in which we live. The work of the maternity hospital is to support the healthiest feeding practice for new infants, which is breast-feeding. To do this we need to keep mothers and babies together, ensure that staff are well educated in lactation medicine, and say no to the formula marketers and all their freebies. From our perspective, eliminating the bags is one step in our long journey to be able to provide better care for every mother and baby who wish to breast-feed.
Hopefully, Massachusetts will be the next bag-free state. Forty-two hospitals, including the one in which we work, have chosen to promote health rather than formula company profits. We have seven sites to go.
Dr. Barbara L. Philipp
Dr. Deborah A. Frank
Anne Merewood
Boston
The writers are in the department of pediatrics at Boston University School of Medicine and on staff at Boston Medical Center. Formula companies’ freebies undermine breast-feeding
I HAVE always enjoyed Joanna Weiss’s work in the Globe, but I was surprised at the short-sightedness of her Dec. 6 op-ed “R.I.’s bottle ban.’’ Formula company freebies hurt all mothers, no matter how they choose to feed their infants.
While these so-called gifts supply only enough formula for a week at most, the bags encourage families to purchase the brand-name formula advertised, instead of cheaper or generic alternatives.
Moreover, the scientific evidence is clear that these bags undermine breast-feeding. Because the only way to sell more formula is to sell less breast-feeding, the companies know that having hospitals give out their bags is one of their most successful marketing strategies. Most mothers do not even meet their own breast-feeding goals, according to data from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The formula freebies are part of the problem.
Breast-feeding is not just an issue about parenting choices. The longer a woman breast-feeds, the lower her risk of breast cancer, ovarian cancer, diabetes, and cardiovascular disease. Hospitals have no business marketing products that interfere with public health. Hospitals should market health, and nothing else.