So far I have told the historical process by which the use of non-human milk to feed babies has become commonplace and a personal option, and that, at the beginning of the commercialization of this product extensively, never demanded scientific evidence of its effects. Now I will end by exposing the health and family benefits that the consider artificial milk as a medicine and also the points against this idea.
Today, although the health authorities expose the health problems related to their use and there are already scientifically proven data that show that, although children fed with artificial milk are fed, if there are inconveniences to the indiscriminate use of the product, both for public health as for the particular health of the users.
Improve breastfeeding rates and give greater guarantees to non-breastfed children
He achieving higher breastfeeding rates is a real public health priority But to achieve this, there are many difficulties: poor training of health workers, lack of myths about breastfeeding, a bad breastfeeding culture that is reached without models and a weak structure that supports and helps mothers by giving them real information. Suffice it to mention that in the United States alone it is estimated that breastfeeding would save a thousand lives a year.
Artificial milk is considered a food, so the controls are those that are carried out on food and contamination cases are detected, since it is not sterile, and of greater real possibilities of certain ailments.
Like everything in life, it has its pros and cons and diseases, except in cases such as product contamination, will always be multifactorial.
But there is no doubt that Non-breastfed children are entitled to the maximum guarantee on the product, which, if contaminated, can even be fatal, and that is still not optimal. I have talked about Considering artificial milk as a medicine would have health benefits
There would be additional advantages if artificial milk were considered a medicine, and in this case they involve the toilets and also, as I will explain below, the family economy.
The toilets do not always have the best possible training in breastfeeding. I detect many cases in which hypolactia is diagnosed without tests or it is recommended to use bottles without helping the mother to solve a problem or effectively increase its production. In addition, weaning is ordered for erroneous causes, such as diseases of the mother or use of medications that would be effectively compatible with breastfeeding. There are some real causes that prevent, medically, breastfeeding, but they are really few.
If doctors were forced to justify why a woman cannot breastfeed and needs a product that replaces what a healthy woman produces, they would have to prove that the case is really medical. If our placenta cannot feed our child, it is considered that there is a medical problem, but if our breasts cannot feed it, no. And I do not understand. Lactation is a natural and normal body function, that all human females are, in principle, prepared to give, and, when the mechanism fails, there are a problem that requires a medical solution or entitles healthcare expenses.
Not being able to breastfeed is a medical issue?
But nevertheless, Artificial breastfeeding is not something as simple as a simple medical issue. And that would be against what we are considering. A woman, for whatever reason, may reject the idea of breastfeeding.
Today, in our culture, the freedom of this election is not questioned, and it would be a separate issue to deepen it. We see breastfeeding as a personal matter and not as a matter of health only, because, in fact, human breastfeeding has many undeniable cultural connotations. It is not a question in which I think it is the moment or the place to go deeper, because the reality is that there are women who do not want to breastfeed.
Further, breastfeeding in humans, as in other primates, is not purely instinctive. It is a partly biological process, but it must also be learned, internalizing its functioning or, if there are problems that the mother cannot solve, have a reliable network of information, help and support. Neither our society, nor the environment, nor health professionals, nor the labor regime help a mother who has trouble breastfeeding get it. That should change, but it remains undeniable that there are many mothers who give up breastfeeding even if they want it.
But, in these cases, force a real and accurate diagnosis before advising the bottle if it would support a health structure that included breastfeeding experts to help them. That would benefit them, I have no doubt about that.
And now, concluding, though consider the impossibility of breastfeeding a medical issue of which the toilets were responsible would have advantages would also have serious disadvantages.
First, feeding, even on such a radical issue as feeding a human baby with an unnatural industrial product for months and exclusively, is not medicating. And that must be taken into account both psychologically and effectively, even though we cannot give the milk that our bodies produce is something that indicates a problem that requires external help. Any other natural body function disabled by internal or external causes will be treated medically, but most will refuse to consider breastfeeding in that way.
Would the quality of artificial milk improve what was considered a medicine?
Beyond these questions, it remains to reflect whether the consider artificial milk a medicine It is essential to improve its quality, have better health services, raise breastfeeding rates and, also, if that would bring real benefits for families who come to this product to nurture their children. I will address it in the next topic of this series.
