This was sort of driving me crazy- Found it! Think it would be a very intriguing way to start a class for teens. From a pamphlet called "Take the Baby-Friendly Initiative! A global effort with hospitals, health services and parents to breastfeed babies for the best start in life. By UNICEF. Undated as best I can tell. "Imagine that the world had invented a new 'dream product' to feed an immunize everyone born on Earth. Imagine also that it was available everywhere, required no storage or delivery-and helped mothers to plan their families and reduce the risk of cancer: Then imagine that the world refused to use it. Towards the end of this century of unprecedented discovery and invention, even as scientists discover the origins of life itself, this scenario is not, alas, a fiction. The 'dream product' is human breastmilk, available to us all at birth, and yet we are not using it. Quite simply but quite certainly, breastfeeding is now an endangered practice around the world, in both rich and poor countries: * There is a universal increase in feeding babies with infant formulas instead of breastmik and a decline in breastfeeding, especially exclusive breastfeeding. * Too many hospitals, the sources and symbols of modern medical practice, hinder breastfeeding through practices such as separating the newborn baby from the mother immediately after birth. * Every year over 1 million infants die, and millions of others are impaired, because they are not adequately breastfed. In all parts of the world babies are being born into unfriendly environments, victims of widespread poverty, rapid urbanization and relentless marketing of breastmilk substitutes. This is happening despite overwhelming scientific evidence that human breastmilk is vastly superior to anything available from our most sophisticated technologies. Science is rediscovering what our great-granparents already knew: that breastfeeding is Nature's perfect 'room service' for newborns, no matter where they are born. Yet this knowledge, both ancient and modern, is not being widely practised by the world's healthcare institutions. Ironically, the nearer a mother is to most modern hospitals the greater the pressures are to stop breastfeeding. Of the world's 4,237 species of mammals, Homo sapiens is the only one threatening Nature's proven method of caring for its newborns. It is clearly time to re-establish the common sense of breastfeeding as common practice. With support from world leaders, health experts and non governmental organizations (NGOs), the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and the World Health Organization (WHO) have now launched the baby-friendly initiative to convince hospitals, health services and parents that breastfeeding gives babies the best possible start in life. 16 more pages. Sincerely, Pat in SNJ Of the qworld's *********************************************** 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