|
YES! THE NESTLÉ
BOYCOTT IS ON!!
Nestlé is the world's largest babymilk seller and in the past has agreed to adhere to the World Health Organization International Code of Marketing of Breast-Milk Substitutes. However, breastfeeding action groups around the world discovered quickly enough that Nestlé's claims and Nestlé's actions are two different things. |
According to the World
Health Organization (WHO) and UNICEF about 1.5 million babies
die every year because they were not breastfed. Many more millions
suffer from infectious diseases and malnutrition, never reaching
their full potential because they were bottlefed. This global
decline in breastfeeding and subsequent "commerciogenic
malnutrition" has been attributed in part to the aggressive
marketing of breastmilk substitutes by the babymilk and babyfood
industry. Subsequently the World Health Assembly ratified a marketing
code designed to protect breastfeeding and ensure the proper
use of artificial feeding when necessary.
|
Why I Care! By Noaimhere As a woman, I care because I know that breastfeeding protects the mother from Hemorrhaging after birth as it contracts the uterus and reduces the bleeding. The incidents of breast cancer, ovarian cancer, osteoporosis, and urinary tract infections are lower in women that have breastfed than in those that feed their children artificially. Breastfeeding mothers enjoy the convenience of always having the perfect food ready and available no matter what the circumstance, even in a natural disaster.
The next time
you happen across a breastfeeding mother, take a moment to let
her know what a noaimhere is
the mother of 3 breastfed children and a breastfeeding advocate
|
People often ask me why I care so much if
a woman breastfeeds or not. Why do I care? I care as a mother
because I know that breastfeeding can save a baby's life. Artificially
fed infants have lower IQs and are more often sick and hospitalized
than breastfed babies. Artificial infant milk increases the risk
of SIDS, Juvenile diabetes, childhood cancer, Chrohn's disease,
ear infections, and obesity. There is also a greater risk of
breast cancer in adulthood for children that are not breastfed.
Here's the hard reality: 1.5 million babies died from unsafe
bottle-feeding in 1998 and of every 1000 babies 
born
in the US, 4 will die from formula feeding.
As
an environmentalist, several things upset me. We first need to
make room for the tremendous 
quantity
of milk cows all over the world. In the United States alone,
20 millions tons of cow milk a year are produce. There is an
immense volume of paper, cardboard, metal and plastics wasted
by baby milk packaging and in the manufacture of bottles and
bottle nipples. In the United States there are approximately
550 millions cans purchased each year! We still haven't even
considered the energy used to produce the Artificial infant milk,
the energy used by the family to prepare it, nor the energy we
use to transport it from around the country and the world. Breastfeeding
simply requires about 500 extra calories a day to be consumed
by the mother. Breastfeeding requires no outside energy nor does
it pollute the earth.
Perhaps
you aren't a mother, baby or environmentalist. Maybe you do not
even know a mother, baby, or 
environmentalist.
Do you know a taxpayer? Ah, I thought so. I also care as a taxpayer.
Did you know that in a 1987 Summary Report from the US Dept.
of Agriculture it was estimated that 29 million dollars could
be saved each year if mother in the WIC program breastfed their
babies for just one MONTH? The US Government buys $600 million
worth of formula each year&cha ching! I have not even mentioned
the added cost of sick baby visits for infants that are not breastfed,
those visits average about $1,500 MORE in the first year of life
than the breastfed baby.
wonderful thing she
is doing. Not only is she reaping the benefits of that first
milky smile, she is saving lives; she is changing the world one
baby at a time.
