I just sent this to NPR.  *I* think it's a great Mother's Day piece, but we'll
wait and see what they think.

Subj:   Listener comment on: baby rats die on shuttle
Date:   98-05-05 23:32:26 EDT
From:   Chrismulfo
To:     [log in to unmask]

My name is Chris Mulford, from Swarthmore, Pennsylvania.  I am a lactation
consultant, which means that I am a student and a teacher of breastfeeding.

Your story about the unexpected high infant mortality among the rats on the
space shuttle got my interest.  You told how lots of the rat babies who flew
into space died because their mothers didn't nurse them.  I don't know why
this should surprise anybody.  Reproduction is tough for all of us mammals.
Zookeepers know that animal mothers are affected by stress.  They do their
best to arrange a low-stress environment where new mothers can feel safe.
Imagine how hard it must be to stay attached to a litter of pups who keep
floating away!

Lactation and the feeding of baby mammals are two beautifully organized
survival processes.  They have been refined through eons of evolution, until
baby whales can nurse under water, baby bats can nurse in mid-air, baby humans
can nurse wherever their mothers go, and baby rats can nurse safe in their
nests.   The wonder of the shuttle story is that, despite the weightless
environment, some of the mothers actually did figure out how to care for their
babies and keep them alive, using tools that originated in a world where
activity is organized by gravity.

What bothered me most in this story was hearing your reporter identify the
cause of death as "bad mothers."  If you're going to be judgmental, I think
the term you needed was "bad planning"!  Or how about "bad idea"?

***

By the way, for my U.S. list-mates, check out the cover of this week's New
Yorker magazine.  It's a cartoon called "Lunch Breaks" by Art Spiegelman (who
is the author of "Maus"), showing a construction worker in a hard hat taking
her lunch break sitting on a girder in a skyscraper...nursing her baby.  The
New Yorker deserves some mega-positive comments for this!  Of course, they
like to be outrageous...