Here's an interesting story in today's Dallas Morning News.  A daycare volunteer
comforted a child (not her own) by breastfeeding it.  Not on the list of usual duties of
daycare workers in the US, so it would be generally unacceptable without the
mother's permission, for good reasons.

My problem is with the last line in the article.  For an expectant mother who is
considering breastfeeding, the blanket statement "Viruses can be transmitted
through breast milk,"  without any further explanation, makes breastfeeding sound
like a very dangerous proposition, even in ordinary circumstances.

What can be done to clarify this issue for this AP story?

Diana Hatch, MS, IBCLC
Denton, Texas

<http://www.dallasnews.com/latestnews/stories/060303dnnatbreast.afc43.html>

 Daycare owner charged with breast-feeding someone else's baby
06/03/2003
Associated Press

STIGLER, Okla. - A woman was charged with breast-feeding someone else's baby at
a daycare center without the parents' knowledge.

Prosecutors charged Shannon Denney, 32, with outraging public decency and public
morals, punishable by up to a year in jail and a $500 fine.

Denney, whose own child attended the daycare center, apparently decided to help
out one day in late November or early December by breast-feeding a 3-month-old
girl, authorities said.

"The baby was crying and they were feeding it a bottle and that didn't stop it,"
prosecutor Ron Boyer said.

The mother found out months later when a rumor circulated around the town of
2,500, he said.

"It got back to the mother," Boyer said. "The mother confronted the woman and
asked her about it and she admitted that it happened."

After the alleged incident, Denney bought the daycare center, but she has since
closed it. She did not immediately return a call Tuesday.

The state Department of Human Services, which licenses daycare centers, has no
policy on breast-feeding someone else's child.

"It's a commonsense sort of thing," department spokesman George Johnson said.
"It's something that today you don't even think about."

Viruses can be transmitted through breast milk.

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