Thanks to my esteemed colleagues Karen Hall BFC, Frances Attenborough BFC and Megan Stephenson BFC, I was interviewed for Pinter and Martin Radio’s Podcast The Breastfeeding Show. They wanted to talk to me about tongue tie.
If you’re struggling with breastfeeding and think your baby may have a tongue tie - or even if you’ve never thought about it but feeding is challenging - have a listen. Get in touch if you want to talk about this more.
Dear National Trust
I am a National Trust member.
I’m also an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) and as such work with families of young babies to support infant and young child feeding.
I am shocked, disappointed and enormously surprised that your organisation has chosen to partner with manufacturer and distributer of artificial breastmilk substitutes, Hipp Organic. To give such a company advertising access to your members and to users of the National Trust estate is unethical and deeply concerning. As an NT member may I ask you to strongly reconsider this inappropriate, damaging and unscrupulous decision.
In particular, may I draw your attention to the following:
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has a Code for the Marketing of Breastmilk Substitutes which aims to contribute to the safe feeding and better nutrition of babies and protect parents and breastfeeding from aggressive marketing of baby foods. It’s a marketing code which aims to restrict promotional practices which entice parents to replace their breastmilk with commercial products. National Trust’s partnership with a formula company in the knowledge that you have many members with young children suggests you have not understood what formula company marketing sets out to do and what protections global health organisations continue to try to put in place to protect those families. Please inform yourselves and your staff. Here is a link to the Code itself https://www.who.int/nutrition/publications/code_english.pdf
This is not about trees and to make it appear so is deeply cynical and insulting to your membership. According to a recent study by Imperial College, London, which was published in the British Medical Journal, “breastfeeding for six months saves an estimated 95-153kg CO₂ equivalent per baby compared with formula feeding”. Marketing of formula milks to new families directly undermines breastfeeding. Formula manufacture and distribution has an enormous negative impact on the environment. (https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.I56460)
The food industry, in particular dairy and meat production, contributes around 30% of global greenhouse gases. Most formulas are based on powdered cows’ milk. The negative environmental impacts come from every element of the production and use of formula milks - the energy consumption to sterilise equipment and safely heat water (equivalent to charging 200 million smartphones each year), as well as the packaging waste (550 million formula cans, comprising 86,000 tons of metal and 364,000 tons of paper into landfill each year) as well as plastic waste and the impact of distribution. Since cows’ milk is nutritionally inadequate for babies, formula contains additives derived from palm oil, rapeseed and sunflower oils, fungal, algal and other oils, all of which are environmentally impactful. Please, again, educate your staff by sharing this information. https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/193226/environmental-cost-formula-milk-needs-global/
The harsh realities of severe health inequality have been laid bare in the UK this past year during the pandemic. Baby feeding is recognised as a public health issue. It is known that breastfeeding has the potential to reduce inequalities in health. Babies who are not breastfed are shown to have increased risk of developing some infections and diseases in their first year of life, during childhood and in later life. Babies born to parents suffering health and social inequalities themselves are less likely to be breastfed, which exacerbates and perpetuates health inequalities already evident in these groups. If you are willing to understand this more deeply, please read this article by parenting charity NCT. https://www.nct.org.uk/sites/default/files/related_documents/BF6Healthinequalitiesrelatedtobabyfeeding.pdf
Please, National Trust, reconsider this sponsorship arrangement. It is unethical, dangerous, undermining, cynical and unscrupulous.
Yours
Jill Shepherd IBCLC
