Now it is time to tell the truth.  Anyone can make any study say
anything they want.  Just because there are studies that say that
progesterone increases the milk supply doesn't mean that it's true.
I'll bet the studies were done by the norplant people who just love this
policy of giving the first dose at day 1.  We are often reading studies
by people that haven't the foggiest notion about breastfeeding or how to
evaluate the adequacy of breastfeeding.  There are theoretical reasons
for not giving the norplant injection immediately.  Dr. Hartmann in
Western Australia feels that, according to his data, it is the *drop in
progesterone levels* after birth which is the stimulus for sensitization
of the alveolar cells to prolactin and thus milk production.  Now it may
not be necessary, or perhaps even a day or two of low progesterone
levels may be enough to cause this sensitization, I don't know.

But what the #@&* is the rush to implant norplant?  I think it is that
many health professionals don't trust women to take control of their own
bodies (not surprisingly, since they have tried to prevent this and have
done more than anyone else to prevent this for many years now).  Another
reason they don't trust breastfeeding for that matter.  They figure they
are just going to run out and start making like little bunnies the day
they get out of hospital, episiotomy or no episiotomy, eh?  I'm not a
woman, so I won't say.  But you out there in Lactnet territory who are
women.  Doesn't this just rot your socks?  Doesn't this just make you
want to scream?

The fact that a physician will *scream* at a nurse is another story.
Male physician?  Female nurse? I will give 3 to 1 odds that it is so.
Would he have screamed at another physician?  Power politics? Control?

Jack Newman, MD, FRCPC