Rachel Myr wrote:
> Heather Neil raises pertinent questions in the matter of the influence
> of maternal diet on the quality of her milk.
> One thing that has never, ever been demonstrated to my knowledge is
> whether milk produced by a mother on a sub-optimal diet gives poorer
> nutrition to her child than any breastmilk substitute would. It's
> hard to imagine a maternal diet that would cause ANY breastmilk
> substitute to surpass the mother's own milk in suitability for her child.
> Of course there are extreme circumstances with environmental pollution
> disasters but that isn't maternal diet, either.
> Rachel Myr
> Kristiansand, Norway
I think we'd be pretty safe in saying, that if the mother is managing to
produce milk at all, it's going to be better quality than any
substitute. Notwithstanding the hygiene issues, it's clear the biology
will protect the infant at the cost of the mother.
Just looking at how maternal milk containing HIV retrovirus, is still
healthier for the baby than substitute, just about says it all.
The mammalian tenancy, if the situation is so threatening that the
offspring are not going to survive, is for the mother to kill and eat
the offspring, in order to fuel her flight. There comes a moment where
having a fertile escapee, is more important than allowing her to die
with the young: if the calories gone into producing the young are to be
lost (the young will die no matter what happens) then the calories have
to recycled. Nothing in the biology of such dire situations, is about
the mother's milk suddenly not being enough - as it's a response to
extreme danger from predators etc
Thankfully, one of the patterns that the human mammal has evolved _not_
to do.
There must be a point where milk will not be produced, as the maternal
body is ravaged - but look at the Auschwitz - Birkenau
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mothers who managed even in the most extreme of deprivations, or Cecily
William's little band in the Japanese camps.
The ability of the human mammal, to continue producing intelligent and
physically alert offspring, in face of extreme nutritional deprivation,
is probably why we've survived as a species- along with our ability to
store all those fat cells for the raw energy required to get us to the
next time of plenty. Times of plenty have buoyed up the baseline, and
off we go into the future, hoping the next generation will get optimum,
as opposed to survival, nutrition. Ironic then, in the extreme, that
it's this very resilience, that masks the damage being done by
artificial feeds - whether it be karo syrup, ground almond milk or
commercial formula.
Just like it's also extremely ironic, that in our first sustained time
of plenty, we are relentlessly filling up all those fat cells, whilst
continuing to be malnourished.
Morgan
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