I want to start a debate about an issue that I have been mulling over. This
is something I think deserves a little thought.

Question: I there any value in supporting Baby Friendly in a country where
less than 5% of births occur in hospital? Most babies are born at local
health centres or at home with either a midwife or a TBA present.

My personal view is that one has to take a long view of the situation. Where
are those midwives trained in the beginning? What is the impact of the
middle class (who can afford hospitals) as a role model for the poor.

When I was a child growing up in Africa we always bought our employees brown
or whole-wheat bread because that is what we ate and believed it was more
nutritious. However, many of the staff were very unhappy about this because
they regarded white bread as superior. Reason for this was that most of the
colonials ate white bread. This is known as role modeling.

With regard to BFH, it could be argued that the results achieved by
supporting/participating in BFH in this situation are not worthwhile. That
is resources should be directed to other nutrition projects?

Would love to hear your responses Lactnetters.


Regards

Mandy O'Reilly

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