Renee's history of the extent of formula company's efforts to capture hospitals as marketers of formula was sad but true. Many health care providers usually don't bother to think who actually pays for the food, dinners, trinkets, and CME/CEs that are distributed by formula companies acting as Santa Claus. None of this stuff is free. The mothers who purchase the formula pay for every bite of food that physicians and nurses put in their mouths as well as every CME or CEU that a physician or nurse obtains by sitting through expensive dinners. Many of the dinners are something that the mothers could never afford for themselves. This stuff is a tax write off for the companies. If mothers can't afford the formula, WIC gives it to them, which means that all US citizens pay for the "free" formula to the tune of $700-$800 million dollars a year. The concept of "free" seems to outweigh the duty of a health care provider or hospital to the patient. More than $1.7 billion is spent on CMEs for physicians, $1 billion of which comes from drug companies. Check out the website www.pharmedout.org. NABA has seen formula companies starting to hire IBCLCs to give these dinner lectures to help peddle the DHA/ARA formula to lactation consultants. One of the first steps to get rid of these commercial predators is to eliminate the formula company discharge bags from the hospital. Ban the Bags has new materials on its website to help, www.banthebags.org. Many hospitals have been approached with free CME/CEs for their physicians and nurses and eagerly accept the bribe. Meanwhile, mothers pay over $20 for a can of organic formula to help feed the formula machine and further compromise US health care providers. How sad that some hospitals and health providers so readily compromise patient health. They are selling themselves cheap to support the greed of corporate interests.
 
Marsha Walker, RN, IBCLC
Weston, MA
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