Here are my responses to various statements and questions on the
topic of breast milk contamination that were posted to the list
during the past week:


1)  Sanna-Mari Tonteri, Feb. 1, posted a summary of an article
published in the Swedish Cancer and Allergy Foundation newsletter:

This is an amazing study, and the first I know that demonstrates
higher cancer rates in breastfed children. Gunilla Lindstrom is
considered by U.S. researchers  a highly credible scientist with a
long track record on breast milk contamination issues.  This study
needs to be looked at very seriously and replicated by others. With
your permission, I'd like to provide your translation to U.S.
researchers here.  Thank you so much for providing this translation
from the Swedish.

2)  Michelle Depesa, Feb. 2: "I have a hard time believing that these
sick stressed, heavily drugged animals [U.S. dairy cows in
confinement] could produce a milk any less contaminated than even the
most junk-food addicted human, living near a nuclear reactor."

Dairy is indeed a leading source of organochlorine exposure in
non-nursing humans.  Butter and whole milk are second only to
freshwater fish, for example, in PCB and dioxin levels.  However,
U.S. dairy cows still produce milk that is 10-20 times less
contaminated with organochlorine compounds than we human women do.

There is plenty of data to substantiate this.  See, for example, A.A.
Jensen and S.A. Slorach, CHEMICAL CONTAMINANTS IN HUMAN MILK (CRC
Press, 1991), p. 215-22; W.J.Rogan, "Pollutants in Breast Milk,"
ARCHIVES OF PEDIATRICS AND ADOLESCENT MEDICINE 150(1996): 981-90; L.
Birnbaum and B.P. Slezak, "Dietary Exposure to PCBs and Dioxins in
Children," ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVES 107(1999):1; O.Papke,
"PCDD/PCDF: Human Background Data for Germany, a Ten Year
Experience," ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVES 106(1998, sup. 2):
723-31.

Judith Schreiber, a lactnet member who recently posted on this topic
(see below), has also done cutting-edge work on this.

Also, remember we non-nurslings can lower our exposure to fat-soluble
contaminants in dairy products by consuming low-fat varieties.
Because it is fat-free, skim milk is essentially free of fat-soluble
contaminants such as dioxin.  Our breastfed children, on the other
hand, receive only whole milk. (Both cow milk and human milk is about
4 percent butterfat.)  Since this fat is essential to their brain
growth and calorie needs, the answer has to be to get the fat-soluble
contaminants out of the human food chain in the first place.

3)  Michelle Depesa, Feb. 2: "Sometimes breastmilk is used as a
poster child for how polluted our environment is, and to the
detriment of both causes.  I don't think there will be much public
outcry over possible pollution in a substance that only about 2 in 5
American babies receives a significant amount of.  Instead, it could
only serve to lower that stat more."

I disagree.  Breastmilk is rightfully the poster child of our
polluted planet because it is the most chemically contaminated of all
human foods.  Our breastfed babies eat one rung higher on the human
food chain than we do, and are therefore receiving the highest levels
of contaminants.

As breastfeeding advocates, we on this listserv have a special
understanding of the sacredness of the breastfeeding relationship as
well as its necessities (I won't call them "benefits") for infant
health.  Who better than us to publicize the ongoing crime of breast
milk's chemical adulteration and demand action?

In Sweden, any breastfeeding mother can submit her milk for testing
at the government lab, the breast milk monitoring program is well
developed and well-publicized, and yet women there have among the
highest breastfeeding rates in the developed world--in spite of their
greater awareness of the toxic chemicals their milk contains.
Clearly, knowledge about the chemical contamination of breast milk
has not served to scare mothers back to formula in Sweden.

I suspect our low breastfeeding rates in the U.S. are mainly due to--

a) our failure to enforce the WHO code and limit aggressive promotion
of formula, thereby corrupting the practice of pediatrics and
obstetrics and deceiving mothers into thinking that differences
between formula and breast milk are trivial; and

b) our failure to provide reasonable paid maternity leaves, thereby
forcing lactating mothers and their symbiotically linked nurslings to
spend their waking days miles apart from each other. (One in the
workplace, the other in a daycare center.)  Under these
circumstances, women give up.

But maybe I'm really overlooking something here.  Does anyone know of
any mothers who gave up breastfeeding solely based on their knowledge
about the contaminants their milk contains?

4)  Valerie McClain, on Feb. 2:  "In reconstituting infant formula,
will a mother be assured that her infant isn't getting any organic
pollutants?  PCBs have been found in municipal drinking water in the
USA.  Are we to assume that after Sept. 11 in NY City (burning
computers etc.) that no PBDEs landed in someone's water supplies.
While formula itself may not have pollutants, one has to be concerned
about the water used to make the formula."

PCBs and other organochlorine chemicals concentrate mightily as they
move up the food chain.  PCBs are present in water but at levels that
are thousands of times lower than in, for example, butter.  PCBs in
Great Lakes salmon are about a million-fold higher than the water
they swim in.  Diet, not drinking water, is thought to account for
about 90 percent of our exposure to PCBs.

Of course, tap water can be contaminated with solvents and
pesticides, in which case BOTH bottle-fed and babies and nursed
babies are exposed.  Remember, contaminants in tap water get into
breast milk when mothers drink the water.  Breastfed babies receive
the contaminants in tap water on top of the other contaminants in
breast milk.  It's a double dose.  The one exception is nitrates.
The breast does seem able to filter these out, so fertilizer
pollution of tap water, which is a big problem in rural areas, seems
to pose a bigger threat to formula-fed babies than breastfed ones.

In short, breastfed babies drink tap water, too!

5)  Valerie McClain, Feb. 3:  "How does seeing a toxin in human milk
predict the health of the infant that will receive it?  Will stopping
or modifying breastfeeding increase an infant's health and
well-being?"

No one knows.  The study that would need to be done to demonstrate
definitively whether nursing infants are incurring real health risks
from consuming breast milk contaminated with toxic chemicals at
current levels would be to do a long-term prospective study of
infants drinking contaminated milk with infants drinking
uncontaminated milk.  This study cannot be done because all breast
milk in the world is now contaminated.  The best we can do is compare
breastfed infants with formula-fed infants or compare breastfed
infants whose mothers have a range of contaminants in the breast
milk, with all other variables held constant  (e.g. presence of a
smoker in the home, etc.)

The good news is that breastfed babies outperform formula-fed ones on
nearly every count--from immune function to IQ to motor skills.
Thus, we haven't yet compromised the goodness of formula to the point
where it is a worse food than formula.  But how reassuring is this
exactly?  Formula feeding, according to Miriam Labbok at USAID, kills
4,000 infants a year in the U.S.  The risk-benefit analysis will
always show that breast is best as long as the contaminants in breast
milk kill only 3,999 children or fewer each year.  I would like to
work for a world in which the risks of breast milk are zero.  Why
should there be any toxic danger in mother's milk?

Comparisons of breastfed children consuming milk over a range of
contaminant levels paint a more disturbing picture.  A number of
European studies, including a very new one from Germany, now show
that nursed infants receiving milk at the highest percentile of
contamination have developmental deficits and/or lowered immune
functioning when compared to infants whose mothers happen to have
cleaner milk.  This the strongest evidence we have that infants are
being harmed by toxic chemicals in breast milk.  It's not just a
hypothetical possibility.

6) Judith Schreiber, Feb. 4:  "My analysis...clearly shows that the
benefits of breastmilk for the prevention of mortality and mobidity
outweighs potential risks due to the trace levels of pollutants in
breast milk."

Judith's work is the standard bearer.  Take a look at her analysis.
(Citation provided in her post.)  The only place where I depart from
Judith is her use of the word "trace levels" because I think the
phrase implies, in the minds of many, that the levels are negligibly
small and therefore we shouldn't worry about them.   Trace compared
to what?  Our own sex hormones are released in "trace amounts" and
yet look at what a powerful effect they have on us.  Our bodies are
designed respond to hormonally active substances at very low levels.
The "trace" levels of DDT that have been detected amniotic fluid
approximate the  levels that testosterone is found in the bodies of
male fetuses during the development of the penis and testicles.
Trace levels can pose significant risks.

7)  Valerie McClain, Feb. 4:  "Are there studies that compare infants
exclusively formula fed versus infants exclusively breastfed in
regard to organochlorine compounds?

Yes.  A German study found that organochlorine contaminants are ten
to fifteen times higher in the bodies of nursed 11 month olds than in
their formula-fed counterparts.  Another study found a 20 fold
difference in organochlorine intake between breast- and bottle-fed
babies.

These differences persist beyond infancy.  Dutch researchers examined
PCB levels are 3.5 years olds.  Those who had been breastfed at least
6 weeks as infants had nearly four times more PCBs in their blood
serum than children who had been formula-fed.  The longer they
breastfed, the higher their body burden.  Even at 25 years of age,
men and women who were breastfed as infants have elevated levels of
organochlorines.

(H. Beck et al., "PCDD and PCDF Exposures and Levels in Humans in
Germany," ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVES 102(1994, sup. 1):
173-85; O.Papke, "PCDD/PCDF: Human Background Data for Germany,"
ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH PERSPECTIVES 106(1998, sup. 2), 723-31; J. Wise,
"High Amounts of Chemicals Found in Breast Milk," BRITISH MEDICAL
JOURNAL 314(1997): 1505; C.I. Lanting et l, "Determinants of
Polychlorinated Biphenyl Levels in Plasma from 42-Month-Old
Children," ARCHIVES OF ENVIRONMENTAL CONTAMINATION AND TOXICOLOGY
35(1998):135-39; S. Patandin, et al., "Plasma Polychlorinated
Biphenyl Levels in Dutch Preschool Children Either Breast-fed or
Formula-fed During Infancy," AMERICAN JOURNAL OF PUBLIC HEALTH
87(1997): 1711-14; S. Patandin et al., "Dietary Exposures to
Polychlorinated Biphenyls and Dioxins from Infancy until Adulthood: A
Comparison Between Breast-feeding, Toddler, and Long-term Exposure,"
ENVIRONMENTAL HEATH PERSECTIVES 107(1999): 45-51.


--
--

Sandra Steingraber, Ph.D.
Visiting Assistant Professor
Program on Breast Cancer and Environmental Risk Factors
110 Rice Hall
Cornell University
Ithaca, NY  14853
[log in to unmask]
www.steingraber.com

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