I have been receiving some emails asking about Medela and the Code as 
well as my role in Code issues. Medela as a manufacturer and 
distributer of products within the scope of the Code has a 
responsibility to market those products within the guidelines specified 
in the Code. They are permitted to sell the products, these products 
can be pictured on their website but the language describing the 
products must not idealize them. The products can be included in pump 
packages but cannot be pictured on the packaging. The following 
violations of the Code have been incurred by Medela:

1. direct advertising to the public in American Baby magazine with a 
feeding bottle and nipple pictured. The picture of the feeding bottle 
and artificial nipple is a violation of the International Code Article 
5 .
2. Pictures of feeding bottles and artificial nipples on the packaging 
of pumps or other equipment is a violation of the International Code 
Article 5.
3. Language in the product description cannot idealize the use of the 
feeding bottle/nipple. Some of the materials intended for distribution 
to mothers contains language that idealizes the use of the 
bottle/nipple for feeding the baby in violation of Article 9.
4. Since Medela is a manufacturer and distributor of products – bottles 
and nipples – that come under the scope of the Code, they may not seek 
contact (Article 5.5) direct or indirect with pregnant women or wit
h 
mothers of infants and young children. Their recent contest giving away 
of glass bottles and their offer to sign up mothers for more give aways 
violates the Code
5. Their TV ad violates the Code with the picturing of the feeding 
bottles and nipples. I could not hear the sound so I don't know what 
was said about the feeding system

I have been asked what my role is in Code issues and how can one person 
determine who is and isn't Code compliant. The National Alliance for 
Breastfeeding Advocacy (NABA) and the Infant Feeding Action Coalition 
(INFACT) Canada as part of the IBFAN (International Baby Food Action 
Network) and representing IBFAN North America play a key role in the 
monitoring and reporting on Code violations for the purpose of 
assisting WHO, governments, professional bodies and manufacturers and 
distributors of products to take appropriate actions. I am the 
executive director of NABA, the US IBFAN organization. It is NABA's 
responsibility to receive and report on Code violations in the US, just 
as INFACT Canada does in Canada and Baby Milk Action does in the UK. It 
is also the responsibility of the IBFAN organizations to assist 
companies to become Code compliant. We do not declare a company in 
violation of the Code so we can be hired to fix them! The companies 
declare themselves in violation of the Code by their marketing actions 
of products covered under the Code.

The Code can be impre
cise at times and is silent on issues related to 
the Internet, mergers and acquisitions, and some of the finer points of 
marketing language. Decisions about some of the finer points of the 
Code, are made in consultation with Betty Sterken at INFACT Canada and 
Joo Kean and Annalies Allain at the International Code Documentation 
Center (ICDC) in Penang. ICDC functions as “Code central” and is the 
repository for all Code documentation and issues. Together we look at 
each suspected violation and endeavor to carefully interpret the 
Articles and subsequent resolutions of the Code that may apply. The 
criteria applied in assessing some of the finer points are how these 
situations protect or undermine breastfeeding, while recognizing that 
the International Code is a minimum standard.

Pumps are not covered under the Code, so we may not like how pumps are 
being marketing but that does not violate the Code.

Marsha Walker, RN, IBCLC
Executive Director, NABA REAL
Weston, MA

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