Hello,
Whenever the subject of Dr. Lucas comes up I have
a slight rise in my blood pressure... as a young
and admittly naive Leader/IBCLC back in Feb 1997 I
attended a talk given by the man, and this is what
I posted to Lactnet back then:


> just an exceprt from Current Issues in Brfdg:
Nurture or Nature, Nutr and MD Jan 97--"Despite
potential benefits, human milk does not meet all
preterm  infants'nutrient requirements."(????):'(
>>

This sounds very much like the statement made by
Dr. Allan Lucas, of IQ
study fame, when he came to my town on tour
promoting a premie discharge
formula *that he invented.*  He was sponsored by
Ross.  He told of his
famous IQ study, how babies fed regular formula
scored 5 points lower on
IQ tests than babies fed special premie formulas.
All of the doctors in
the audience were VERY impressed.  I was thrilled
at what I expected to
come next-- the information that babies fed human
milk instead of
formula scored much higher on IQ tests.  BUT, he
never bothered to share
this little piece of information.  He went on to
"dis" human milk, using
a comment similar to the one above, among others.

BTW, one fact overlooked in the IQ study is the
statistic that BOYS fed
regular formula instead of special premie formula
scored a full 13
points lower on IQ tests.  Now doesn't that make
your skin crawl?  Think
about the general premature population, and then
think about that
statistic.  Think about boys in the inner city
with it's inferior
educational opportunities.  ...I digress.

The main thrust of his talk was that after premies
are discharged from
hospital, "we have to worry about whether they
will be fed properly--"
thus, *special discharge formulas.*  It wasn't
lost on me that another
way to put it was "We can't trust these mothers to
feed their babies
right."  Well, "duh" if staff spend the early
weeks discouraging the
formation of healthy attachments and feelings of
confidence in the
ability to care for one's own child!

Dr. Lucas made the following statements about
breastfeeding:
"We have no idea whether sending them home
breastfeeding is beneficialornot."
"There is really no difference in growth between
breastfed and bottlefed
babies- in fact the bottle fed babies may even
grow better."

"Since babies aren't meant to be born too soon, we
really don't have agood
way to feed them, so (get this): if it turns out
that human milk meetstheir
needs it is almost a coincidence."

He seemed to gloss over the benefits of breastmilk
by saying that it is
somewhat protective for NEC, and IS better
tolerated by the baby but "at
the end of the day it does not meet the needs of
babies."

Obviously, not only do we have to be concerned
about who OWNS these
babies, we also must be wary about WHO STANDS TO
GAIN, FINANCIALLY, by
feeding them.

Sue Jacoby, IBCLC California, who has looked into
the eyes of corporate greed,
and it was ugly.


______________________________________________
FREE Personalized Email at Mail.com
Sign up at http://www.mail.com/?sr=signup

             ***********************************************
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