Milk formula coys breach global infant feeding practices
By, Tada JUTHA Maiduguri
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has said that the formula milk companies (FOMCs) have breached global feeding practices of infants.
According to the Fund, over 50% of parents and pregnant women have been targeted with the marketing by global milk companies.
UNICEF’s Executive Director, Catherine Russell, yesterday (Monday), in Maiduguri, disclosed that women ranked health professionals, as their most important source of feeding advice, including the recommendations on formula feeding of infants.
She said that a report titled: “How marketing of formula milk influences our decisions on infant feeding,” stated that it uncovers systematic and unethical marketing strategies used by the formula milk industry.
The report also lamented that the milk marketing strategies, are to influence parents’ feeding decisions.
The Director-General of World Health Organisation (WHO), Dr. Tedros Ghebreyesus said: “WHO, UNICEF and partners are calling on Governments, health workers, and the baby food industry to end exploitative formula milk marketing.” urging that they should abide by the feeding code requirements.
He warned that the industry marketing techniques, which comprise unregulated and invasive online targeting; sponsored advice networks, helplines, free gifts, and other practices to influence training and recommendations among health workers.
Besides, he further warned: “The messages that parents and health workers receive are often misleading, unsubstantiated, and violate the international code of marketing of breast milk substitutes, which was passed by the World Health Assembly in 1981,” noting that this is to protect mothers from aggressive marketing practices by the baby food industry.
He said that regulations on exploitative marketing must be urgently adopted and enforced to protect children’s health.
According to him, false and misleading messages about formula feeding are a barrier to breastfeeding.
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Citing Nigeria, he said that 73 percent of women expressed a strong desire to breastfeed exclusively to keep the infants healthy and strong
Health professionals in Nigeria reported that contact with formula milk companies was extremely common in public and private health care settings.
In Nigeria, where women ranked health professionals as their important sources of feeding advice, 33% surveyed pregnant women said they received a recommendation to formula feed by a health professional.
