Toothless tiger guides milk sales
Those monitoring the voluntary formula code would be better employed developing advertising of human milk, says Sue Cox
EVERY year throughout the world, trillions of litres of human milk are not used.
Millions of newborn babies miss out on their initial immunisation from drinking the colostrum their mothers make for them. The antibodies in colostrum and human milk reduce the risk of infections in the baby. Human milk also protects against lifelong diseases including Type 1 diabetes.
Like all other female mammals, human mothersto-be gain weight during pregnancy. This weight is a store of nutrients from their diet. This reserve assists in making milk over the early months of motherhood. As a result, the extra weight gained during pregnancy gradually diminishes and the mother’s weight returns to normal.
Considering that receiving human milk reduces the likelihood of infant infections and the scourge of adult female obesity it would seem that actively advertising human milk would be a cheap and effective way of having a healthy nation.
To the contrary, successive federal governments have not made it a priority to lessen the aggressive and emotional advertising of human milk substitutes that increase the national health costs.
Signatories to the 1992 Marketing in Australia of Infant Formulas agreement are the importers and manufacturers of dried cow’s and goat’s milk for infants.
It is a voluntary, selfregulating code. In the boardrooms of these companies there is unlikely to be any importance attached to following this voluntary code, particularly because such a code would likely affect the company’s profits and their ever increasing export market.
Complaints against a marketing activity by a company can be made by any Australian.
Of the eight complaints received by the Marketing in Australia of Infant Formulas Complaints Committee in 2019 and early 2020 all were found to be either out of the scope of the committee or the advertisers had not breached the self-regulated guidelines. Members of this toothless tiger committee would be better employed developing positive, contemporary advertising of human milk.
Australian adults rarely reconstitute powdered cow’s or goat’s milk for their own use. Therefore why is it OK for babies to receive such milk? In fact a large percentage of Australian babies are fed human milk substitutes from a bottle, often by someone other than their mother.
It is the birthright of every newborn to be healthy and to spend hours in their mother’s arms drinking the milk that their mother makes specifically for them.
Researchers have estimated that if the more than 300,000 babies born in Australia each year received the 300 litres of milk that their mothers are capable of producing over 12 months, the worth to the Gross Domestic Product would be $3 billion.
Governments need to find a way to encourage and support the utilisation of this vast and important resource.
SUCCESSIVE FEDERAL GOVERNMENTS HAVE NOT MADE IT A PRIORITY TO LESSEN THE AGGRESSIVE AND EMOTIONAL ADVERTISING OF HUMAN MILK SUBSTITUTES