Kathleen writes in response to the inquirer, who wants to know how to rid
the OB and peds office of parenting magazines that are rife with
International-Code-violating marketing.

She says, "When I asked my advisor at Baby Friendly USA about this problem, I
was told that in a physician's office, or waiting room in the hospital or
affiliated offices, reading materials are considered entertainment--the
same as a TV program would be.  We are not expected to be able to control
everything a pregnant woman sees."

Fair enough.  Baby-Friendly status here in the USA would probably never
occur if we truly had to get rid of all those magazines in every waiting
room everywhere.

But even ripping out the formula ads hardly makes these magazines good
reading material.  When is the last time you picked up one of the mags, and
read what the *articles* have to say about pregnancy, labor, BFg, stretch
marks, foods, sleeping ...?  Aye yi yi they are, most of 'em, simply horrid.

We don't have to be in charge of the world, but as providers of health care we
sure as heck can endeavor to be in charge of our own facilities and office
spaces.  We can choose what sort of reading materials we put in front of a
mother.  The very presence of those mags and their ads in the healthcare
setting "bathes the product with the legitimacy of the healthcare
profession," as I like to put it.

Don't be the "carrier" of such judgmental and flat-out incorrect
information. Let the mother read her horrid articles from the magazine that
she flips through at the grocery store...not your clinic rooms. Whip out
the Surgeon General's Call to Action to Support BFg, and Action Steps 7-12,
that describe health care system actions  to make breastfeeding easier for
families.

Ask them where they *do* draw the line on what they'd allow in the waiting
rooms on the "we can't control what they see" theory.  Is a catalogue for
sexy lingerie OK in a room full of pregnant women?  How's about
Cosmopolitan?  A cigar aficionado mag?  One for hunters?  How's about  Ezzo
or another "child-training" book? A little light porn?

-- 
Liz Brooks, JD, IBCLC, FILCA
Wyndmoor, PA, USA

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