Thanks, Ellen, for alerting us to this. I was recently at a nutrition 
conference in Sydney where there was a satellite seminar one evening 
on probiotics. Note that the organisms are the 'probiotics'. 
Prebiotics are the substances that encourage growth of the probiotic 
organisms. It is the organisms that are a potential concern. Speakers 
from Finland at the seminar discussed development and use of 
probiotics - it was not specifically about infant feeding, although 
the effects on allergy and eczema in infants were mentioned.

One speaker, an Australian, gave a sobering presentation amongst 
these about safety of probiotics. She stressed that the safety cannot 
be assumed, and that conventional toxicology and safety evaluation is 
of limited value in the case of probiotic bacteria. There is debate 
still over what constitutes appropriate safety testing, so some would 
argue that putting these into infant formula and testing on real 
babies seems a bit premature. No-one knows what these bacteria might 
do even in adults yet, let alone an immunologically-immature infant. 
Some researchers feel that there has been nowhere enough study done 
on these yet.

Interestingly, one speaker began by talking about how infants obtain 
their microbiota (ie microorganism mix in the gut) from their mother 
- from her skin and prebiotics (oligosaccharides) in her breastmilk. 
Then later from food and other influences such as antibiotics, 
stress, gastro disease, etc. He said that breastfeeding sets up the 
microbiota for years. Presumably, the most profound effect would be 
seen in mothers who birth their babies at home and have skin-to-skin 
contact automatically and breastfeed exclusively. The bacteria from 
hospitals and staff, effects of antibiotics given to mothers and 
artificial feeding would all interrupt this process. Perhaps in 
Finland, mothers have less of these interventions??

Sam Doak wrote:
><<No statistically significant difference in recumbent length, head
>circumference, or incidence of
>adverse events was found between the two groups. Infants in the
>experimental group had fewer incidences of constipation and had stool
>characteristics that suggest that the experimental formula was tolerated
>well.
>Furthermore, these infants showed a trend toward fewer respiratory tract
>infections.>>
>
>But, how did they compare with the breastfed infants? "Fewer incidences" is
>still more than "normal" for an infant.

I agree that there should be controls of breastfed babies in these 
sorts of studies, but we are probably only dreaming!

I also noticed the careful wording in this abstract - nothing about 
statistical significance except that there was none in adverse 
events, etc. Were the 'fewer instances of constipation' significant? 
The stool characteristics 'suggest' it was tolerated well, and there 
was a 'trend' towards fewer infections. Wishy-washy, non-scientific 
terminology that really tells the reader nothing but subliminally 
implies that the test formula was 'better'. Perhaps the full article 
would reveal more scientific results.

At least the funding source was declared!
-- 
******************************************************************
Joy Anderson B.Sc. Dip.Ed. Grad.Dip.Med.Tech. IBCLC
Australian Breastfeeding Association counsellor, Nutrition student
Perth, Western Australia.   mailto:[log in to unmask]
******************************************************************

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