Nestle makes PR blunder in Ethiopia
Infant formula milk push
The whole Nestle mess has two main roots. The first is its aggressive promotion of infant formula milk in developing countries, like Ethiopia, at the expense of breast milk. This has been in defiance of the World Health Organization (WHO) which advocates exclusive breastfeeding for the first four to six months if possible and which, in 1981, passed an International Code of Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes to protect against unscrupulous encouragement to bottlefeed.
Milk substitutes need to be made up with water. So, wherever there is water of dubious quality — abundant in third world countries where poor hygiene and poor water supply are common — there are huge risks of introducing virulent water-borne diseases to babies from bottled formula milk.
Dr Raj Anand, trained in medical college in Britain and now one of India's top pediatricians, says babies fed on infant formula are 14 times more likely to die from diarrhoea than those who are breastfed. He has waged a decades-long campaign against Nestle for paying incentives to Indian general practitioners to recommend Nestle baby milk powder to new or expectant mothers rather than breast milk.
Around the world, the case against Nestle since 1979 is that the company has systematically and cynically undermined the WHO's and many other organizations' promotion of breastfeeding. Nestle was sending — and in some countries still does — its salesmen into maternity units in poor countries dressed in white doctors' lab coats to give a false impression of authority. They were handing out gift packs of bottles and milk powder to new mothers, thereby undermining their commitment to breastfeeding.
"When newborn babies are given a bottle, they are less able to suckle well," said James Grant, executive officer of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF). "This makes breastfeeding failure likely, and the baby is then dependent on artificial milk.
"When the mother and baby leave hospital the milk is no longer free. At home parents are forced to buy more Nestle or other formula milk, which can cost 50% of the family income. Because the milk is so expensive the child is not fed enough and malnutrition and associated diseases set in. Contaminated water mixed with the formula leads to diarrhoea, malnutrition and death."
UNICEF estimates 1.5 million babies will die this year from unsafe bottle feeding. "Every day some 3,000 to 4,000 infants die because they are denied access to adequate breast milk," said Grant.
From an article by Fred Brigland in Japan Today (24 Dec 2002)
The whole Nestle mess has two main roots. The first is its aggressive promotion of infant formula milk in developing countries, like Ethiopia, at the expense of breast milk. This has been in defiance of the World Health Organization (WHO) which advocates exclusive breastfeeding for the first four to six months if possible and which, in 1981, passed an International Code of Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes to protect against unscrupulous encouragement to bottlefeed.
Milk substitutes need to be made up with water. So, wherever there is water of dubious quality — abundant in third world countries where poor hygiene and poor water supply are common — there are huge risks of introducing virulent water-borne diseases to babies from bottled formula milk.
Dr Raj Anand, trained in medical college in Britain and now one of India's top pediatricians, says babies fed on infant formula are 14 times more likely to die from diarrhoea than those who are breastfed. He has waged a decades-long campaign against Nestle for paying incentives to Indian general practitioners to recommend Nestle baby milk powder to new or expectant mothers rather than breast milk.
Around the world, the case against Nestle since 1979 is that the company has systematically and cynically undermined the WHO's and many other organizations' promotion of breastfeeding. Nestle was sending — and in some countries still does — its salesmen into maternity units in poor countries dressed in white doctors' lab coats to give a false impression of authority. They were handing out gift packs of bottles and milk powder to new mothers, thereby undermining their commitment to breastfeeding.
"When newborn babies are given a bottle, they are less able to suckle well," said James Grant, executive officer of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF). "This makes breastfeeding failure likely, and the baby is then dependent on artificial milk.
"When the mother and baby leave hospital the milk is no longer free. At home parents are forced to buy more Nestle or other formula milk, which can cost 50% of the family income. Because the milk is so expensive the child is not fed enough and malnutrition and associated diseases set in. Contaminated water mixed with the formula leads to diarrhoea, malnutrition and death."
UNICEF estimates 1.5 million babies will die this year from unsafe bottle feeding. "Every day some 3,000 to 4,000 infants die because they are denied access to adequate breast milk," said Grant.
From an article by Fred Brigland in Japan Today (24 Dec 2002)
posted by vteo at 5:43 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home