Forget the war on Christmas, a much more serious and disturbing trend determined to dethrone and derail mothers who choose to use infant formula over breastfeeding are being fired upon. Many times formula is the best option for their own families and yet they’re being attacked by the government via pressures from political extremists using your tax dollars to fund the criticism and violaton of your civil rights. Yes, once again, breastfeeding has become a demonstration of politics and once again, has given power to extremists and radicals over sensibility, truth and common sense.

And if that weren’t enough to make you think the nation has gone completely mad, Tom Harkin, Democratic Senator from Iowa, is trying to push through a law that would require formula containers to boast warning labels much like the ones found on cigarettes.

According to Sci-tech-today.com, the labels would read:

They would say that the Department of Health and Human Services has determined that “breast-feeding is the ideal method of feeding and nurturing infants” or that “breast milk is more beneficial to infants than infant formula.”

As I’ve stated before, ideal situations are not always indicative of reality. In an ideal world I would not have an inverted uterus, I would never feel pain, I would have won the lottery and had kids that were seen and not heard and my Pug dog would never whizz on my hardwood floors, and oh yeah, and there would be world peace and I would be Miss America.

So, in light of that pipedream: Dear Government, I am not a moron and I do not appreciate your insults to my intelligence by requiring a company to question my nurturing intentions and ability to decide what’s best for me and my baby. Stay out of my parenting decisions and do not give into cult-like fringe groups who seek to take away my civil liberties and rights that inherently allow me to mother in the way I deem is best for my family.

And why, you ask, should you be afraid of some Senator in po-dunk Iowa? Because, if he succeeds, this will be a nation-wide requirement, a requirement that will only seek to single out formula feeding moms, scold them and use government intervention to persuade you to hold the value system of some mother down the street,, or even your neighbors, but perhaps not your own. Even if it is your own, do you really want to live in a country that manipulates and scares women into using their body in a way they may not be comfortable with or quite possibly does not function the way biology intended it to? Not every woman can breastfeed without serious complications, ones with varying degrees of success in overcoming obstacles.

But, it doesn’t stop there. Formula, as a safe alternative, has fallen victim to special interests groups and has recruited the United States Government to interfere with and influence our personal lives on behalf of parenting politics. It is one thing to interfere on the behalf of an act that is conclusively dangerous, but formula, made under safe conditions, is not conclusively dangerous. In fact, I will go the extra step that most columnists (or bloggers) are afraid to say out loud and say that most of what you hear about breastfeeding is a gross exaggeration. (Yep! I said it.)

From Slate.com, Sydney Spiesel dispels many of the myths and exaggerations associated with the dissemination of little knowledge as wrecks havoc on our ability to be truly informed. Read it and weep:

When you ask a bunch of doctors about how breast-feeding prevents infection, they get it wrong—I know they do, because I’ve asked the question. Doctors tell you that colostrum (produced in the first three days or so after a baby is born) and breast milk are full of maternal antibodies. Next, doctors say that these maternal antibodies are absorbed into the infant’s blood circulation and thus serve to protect infants from disease.

That’s the correct description of the immunology of breast-feeding for most mammals. It’s also true that human colostrum and milk are rich in maternal antibodies—colostrum is pretty much antibody soup. And babies take in these antibodies as they nurse. But human babies are never able to absorb maternal antibodies from milk or colostrum into the bloodstream, except perhaps in the minutest amounts. Maternal antibodies in milk and colostrum protect against infection—but only locally, working inside the baby’s gastrointestinal tract.

This information will surprise farmers, veterinarians, and strongly invested proponents of breast-feeding. After all, if a newborn piglet is deprived of its mother’s colostrum for the first eight hours of life, it is almost guaranteed to become sick and die. Similarly, newborn horses, cats, dogs, and most other mammals are not likely to survive long if they are deprived of colostrum. The reason is simple: Most mammals are born without any antibodies, or only the tiniest amounts, circulating in their blood. That leaves them defenseless at birth against viruses, bacteria, and other pathogens. Fortunately, for a brief period after birth, the antibody molecules in colostrum can easily pass through the bowel walls of babies of each of these species.

But human newborns, it turns out, differ from most other mammals in the way they acquire maternal antibodies. (Before the creationists get too excited, I should point out that everything I am about to say applies to monkeys as well as to people.) Newborn infants get their maternal protection before birth, via an active transport system in the human placenta that carries maternal antibodies from the mother to the fetus. Unlike all those other animals, human babies are born with all the maternal antibodies they will ever have. That’s why we don’t need to absorb maternal antibodies from colostrum. And it’s why formula-fed babies are not at a disadvantage, compared with breast-fed babies, in their supply of circulating maternal antibodies.

None of this is my discovery. It was well-known, even commonplace, in the immunological literature of 40 years ago. But as the field turned to other matters, these findings just sort of fell out of fashion (though I’ve certainly come upon plenty of modern papers whose authors understand the idea). Because of the modern aversion to looking at older research, a surprisingly large number of doctors, especially nonimmunologists, have either forgotten this aspect of human immunity or never knew about it. And perhaps nobody wanted to bring the older findings to light for fear that doing so might discourage breast-feeding. (I can assure you that I feel some trepidation as I write this.)

Before breast-feeding’s able defenders come after me with pitchforks, I’d like to reiterate that I’m only talking here about the incorrect idea that maternal antibodies in milk or colostrum protect against diseases by being absorbed in the baby’s blood. The breast milk antibodies are present in the babies’ intestines, and while they’re not absorbed, they still protect against diarrheal disease, and perhaps other infections as well. This is a huge boon in parts of the world where sanitation is poor and refrigeration nonexistent.

Breast-feeding protects against diarrheal ailments in three ways. Infants who nurse are not drinking formula, which is a perfect medium for bacteria if it’s not refrigerated and if it is reconstituted with contaminated water, as is typically the case in nonindustrialized countries. And if infants are exclusively breast-fed during the vulnerable first six months of life, they’re also not taking in contaminated food. Finally, the maternal antibodies in a baby’s gut deactivate swallowed bacteria and viruses that might otherwise infect the cells that line the intestine or penetrate the lining. Most often this prevents bacterial or viral gastroenteritis, which presently kills 1.6 million children worldwide a year.

Fifteen years ago, the Innocenti Declaration in support of breast-feeding was adopted internationally. Since then, breast-feeding has increased dramatically around the globe. In 2005, UNICEF estimated that 6 million infant lives worldwide (most in the developing world) are saved annually by policies that have replaced formula with breast-feeding. It is likely that a substantial fraction of the 1.6 million infants who still die of diarrheal disease could be saved by breast-feeding as well.

What should we make of the facts about the immunobiology of lactation? First, it bears repeating that even if the immunological benefits are often overstated, there is clear and obvious benefit to breast-feeding in most of the developing world. Second, though it is harder to demonstrate in a scientifically satisfying way, there are probably other biological benefits. And there are surely economic reasons to give babies human milk instead of formula, which costs between $1,500 and $3,000 a year. In the developing world, the economic case against formula-feeding might be as potentially lifesaving as the immunological one: Money stolen from a poor family’s budget for formula will not be available for food, housing, education—or even soap.

In the end, though, I find myself falling back on the same logic (or lack of logic) that appealed to me when my babies were born. Biologically speaking, it seems as if breast-feeding ought to be better for babies. At the same time, I am strongly convinced that there are two kinds of nutrition, physical and psychological, and that both are equally important. This conviction persuades me that it’s better for a mother to formula-feed her baby pleasurably than to breast-feed and hate it. Fortunately, the majority of mothers enjoy nursing. But not all. Some women don’t like to nurse, and others, even with the best help, find it physically difficult or daunting or intolerably uncomfortable. Sometimes, also, babies just aren’t good nursers. In the end, I always encourage a mother to choose the feeding method that is most satisfying to her. Read the rest…

Getting back to how the government seeks to run interference in your private life, The United States Department of Health and Human Services has just green lighted a controversial campaign in which advertisements show pregnant women acting like idiots and using extremely poor judgment, which puts their babies at risk of dying and asking you to examine your willingness to formula feed as a metaphor for killing your baby. (I actually remember these ads making a one time appearance many years ago and then being pulled because of inaccuracies, but hey, who cares about civil rights and truth, right??)

In fact, The New York Times reported on June 13, 2006 the benefit of breastfeeding against childhood obesity. This is an example of how difficult it can be to ascertain the endless flow of conflicting information. They even acknowledge in this article that it’s far from being an absolute:

The potential for curbing childhood obesity was one of the selling points of a recent national campaign to promote breast-feeding. One magazine advertisement featured a bowl of ice cream with two scoops of vanilla, each dotted with a cherry in the middle.

“Breast-feed for six months,” the caption said. “You may help reduce your child’s risk for childhood obesity.”

Studies have found that breast-fed children are 20 to 45 percent less likely to be obese than children who were never breast-fed, said to Kathryn G. Dewey, a professor of nutrition at the University of California, Davis. The longer a child is breast-fed, the better, according to one analysis published last year, which concluded that a child’s risk of being overweight dropped by 4 percent for each month of breast-feeding.

But research has not established that nursing actually causes children to be leaner. American mothers who breast-feed are different from those who don’t — they tend to be older, more educated and wealthier. Obese women often have difficulty breast-feeding, so those who breast-feed are less likely to be overweight. And they probably make healthier dietary and life choices for their families, so their children are probably at lower risk for being overweight in the first place.

“Breast-feeding may be associated with reduced obesity in later life, but the effect is likely to be small,” said Christopher Owen, a community health researcher at the University of London who analyzed 70 studies in a 2005 paper for The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.

Apparently, The New York Times didn’t get the memo however, as the verdict is still out on this one:

The researchers used DXA to measure the body composition, particularly the fat tissue, of 313 Caucasian and African American five-year-old children. They had previously gathered information on breastfeeding, infant formula use and the timing of the introduction of complementary foods from the children’s mothers when the children were three years old. The researchers defined complementary food as anything other than breast milk, formula or water. They asked mothers when their children started drinking juice or eating infant cereal, baby food or table food.

The research team found no significant difference in fat mass between children that were ever breastfed and those never breastfed. Children who were breastfed for a longer duration and those who were breastfed without concurrent formula feeding did not have significantly lower fat mass than did those children who were never breastfed. Children also did not differ if they were introduced to complementary foods before or after four months of age.

It has been suggested that children that are exclusively or predominantly breastfed for the first four months of life have a different growth pattern than children who are not fed breast milk for the first four months of life. In this study the researchers found no difference in fatness between these two groups of children at 5 years of age.

Conflicting information remains even as much as breastfeeding is scientifically proven to be more beneficial in many regards, but that doesn’t mean that formula feeding is dangerous, immoral, risky, unhealthy or inappropriate. In fact, the most disturbing part about this campaign is, that it’s a lie, a misrepresentation and a fictitious fallacy. Formula feeding is not a reckless behavior, nor is it a detriment to babies health in general. In fact, millions of babies thrive on infant formula every day. The reality of it is, you don’t have to breastfeed to have a healthy baby, so if it isn’t about health, what is it about?…It’s about mandating your private life to follow the opinions and moral convictions of radicals and those that haven’t enough information to provide the truth to mothers.

I believe that sometimes the intent of certain sub-cultures within our society is so off-base and senseless that everyday, sensible people dismiss it and that could be a grave mistake if not taken seriously. Breastfeeding moms, formula feeding moms and those who value our freedom need to take a stand. Clearly, the government is overstepping its boundaries here. Please don’t become complacent. Please do not contribute to the movement of our society towards social dictatorship.

Curious about the ads already? Decide for yourself:

To contact the DHH and Tom Harkin to voice your concern about our civil liberties, please email them or phone them and tell them you won’t tolerate these personal violations and that come voting time, your freedom will be in the forefront of your voting decisions. Pass this message on and email these zealots and tell them you’re not going to stand by and take abuse or allow others to experience abuse when there are real problems in our society that need to be addressed.

Click here to contact Tom Harkin, Senator of Iowa.

To contact the DHHS in protest of these hyperbole ads, see the information below to call or mail:

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
200 Independence Avenue, S.W.
Washington, D.C. 20201
Telephone: 202-619-0257
Toll Free: 1-877-696-6775

Stand up for your basic rights and stop this rubbish in which the DHHS has publicly compared formula feeding to smoking while pregnant. This is not scientifically sound and these sort of tactics should not be tolerated in a free society and certainly should not be using my tax money to perpetuate such a sham.

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