Friday 25 February 2011

Breast milk ice cream? Really!

Would you eat it?

I understand all milk is "breast" milk, but we are talking about human milk here. Farming women for milk is not really an option is it? So should we squander it on ice cream?

I am not one to judge people on how they go about earning some extra cash. But when there are children whose entire survival depends on someone donating breast milk, this kind of enterprise disturbs me. Premature infants and babies of very low birth weight need breast milk and there is a lot of data showing why synthetic supplements just won't do what breast milk can to help these babies pull through. It wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that their entire survival depends on their mothers or donors making human milk available. Donor milk becomes extremely important when birth mothers are unable to produce adequate milk for infants who are not able to suckle yet.

Perhaps if the health care industry paid women to donate milk we might be able to build a larger bank of donor milk for babies in need rather than indulgent adults.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

http://www.parentcentral.ca/parent/babiespregnancy/babies/article/945963--breast-milk-ice-cream-seized-over-health-complaints

The Dork said...

Thank you for the link. This story is certainly worth watching to see how it develops.