> (For those who don't know, WIC stands for "Women, Infants, and Children"
> is a govt.-funded nutrition program for moderate-low income moms and
> their babies under 5 yrs. of age (6 yrs. in some states.)
I was interested to hear that WIC would be getting the new formulae.
I do not know if we have a similar programme to WIC here in Québec
(maybe Dany Gauthier would know better than I!), but we do have a
programme called "OLO", which can be viewed in french at:
http://www.fondation-olo.qc.ca . OLO stands for oeuf, lait, orange
(egg, milk, orange). They concentrate mainly on pregnant and lactating
women, providing them with the equivelant of 1 egg per day, one orange
(or 5-oz glass of orange juice) per day, and 1 litre of cow's milk per
day. They say this gives 32% of the pregnant woman's needs
(energy-wise) and 64% of her protein needs.
In some ways I think it is an excellent programme, an excellent start,
anyhow, especially as women who are nursing continue to reap the
benefits of it for...I think the first 12 months after birth, but I'm
not sure.
However, I was interested to see that they are affiliated with Natrel,
one of our big milk producers (I bet they get free milk) and I did write
them a letter to say that there are a lot of women who are unable to
drink cow's milk, and that perhaps they should review their policy to
allow women who are unable to drink it, or who choose not to drink it,
to choose either goat's milk or another substitute (soy milk, rice milk,
etc.). I haven't had a response back from them, and I doubt I will, but
I did mention to them that (like the dairy board's advertisement on TV)
I think it is a disservice to our population to make nursing moms think
they have to drink milk in order to nurse (or to stay healthy while
nursing, at the very least), because attitudes like that will make for
fewer nursing moms among the ladies who are scared their child will miss
out on something.
Just the other day at our monthly meeting we had one woman who said she
tried very hard to eat a bit of ice cream in the day because she hated
youghurt and couldn't stomach cow's milk or cheese, and did we think it
was enough for her as a nursing mom. Yet again we were able to set her
straight by telling her that lots of people in the world live without
ever drinking milk from another animal, and the key is a balanced diet
with lots of fresh vegetables and some protein and complex
carbohydrates, rather than lots of milk everywhere. :-)
Fio
ressource person with Allaitement Québec
nursing mama to Sandrine, 23 mos
and
#2, 11/2002
***********************************************
The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM)
mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html
|
