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Subject:
From:
Darillyn Starr <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Lactation Information and Discussion <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Fri, 3 Jun 2011 16:50:35 -0600
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As an adoptive mother who had to supplement quite a bit, and who counsels other adoptive mothers, the question of donated breast milk is something that I have dealt with a lot.  I have given my own babies some donated milk, when I could get it. With my first baby, born 28 years ago (right before HIV/AIDS became widely known), a La Leche League leader gave me some milk she had in her freezer from a member who had more than she could use.  Other than that, it has all come from moms I knew, personally.  I have generally counseled other moms to stick with accepting donations from women they know, personally, too.

The reactions I have seen to the whole topic of using donated breast milk have varied greatly.  I once had someone who is a big name in formal milk banking soundly chastise me for suggesting that it might be reasonable for adoptive mothers to accept breast milk donated from "trusted family members or friends".  She said that it was extremely irresponsible for me to make that suggestion, that those babies would be getting every illness that anyone in the donor's home had, and would even result in some babies dying.  That was only part of it. I was shocked.  As an expert on human milk, she surely should have known that breast milk contains antibodies and not straight viruses from common ailments. It was not like having adoptive moms giving their babies privately 
donated breast milk was a threat to the human milk banking industry, and her livelihood, either.

On the other side of the coin are people who think it is reasonable to pay good money to have frozen milk sent from someone they have never laid eyes on.  That, I don't agree with.  Yes, most of the time it will be OK, but once it becomes big money, there are going to be people who will be tempted to stretch the milk with a little water, or formula, or something else, or even try to pass off something that isn't human milk at all.  I, personally, don't think it is worth the risk to purchase human milk from an unknown source.  

Quite a few adoptive moms now use milk that is donated by someone they find through an organization that matches moms with extra milk with moms who, for whatever reason, are not providing 100% of the milk their babies need.  The receiving mother covers the costs of collecting and transporting the milk, and may send gifts to the donor, but the donor is not paid for the milk.  It still makes me a little nervous, but not as much for the babies as for the donors.  We all know how often breast milk is blamed for some kind of problem a baby has.  I am afraid that, if a baby who is the recipient of the milk becomes seriously ill, or even dies, as babies sometimes do, a mother who has donated her milk might be sued, even in the absence of evidence that the breast milk had anything to do with it.  I doubt that a lawyer would have much trouble finding an MD who would be willing to testify that donated breast milk is dangerous, since there are so many who think milk from a baby's biological mother is suspect.

Anyway, that is my 2 cents!  

Darillyn
 		 	   		  
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