Just to add my tuppence worth here to Karleen's prescience, and with
respect to Diane, ask people to Watch Their Langauge.
Those of us in the lactation community who disagree with mothers taking
control of their own milk supply, are using very specific language..
The Risks of Informal Milk Sharing.. casual milk sharing... unprocessed
milk sharing... all of which are misnomers.
What is being discussed by the mothers taking control, is the difference
between Informed, and Uninformed, Milk Sharing.
"Informal" milk sharing is being used to suggest no discipline,
methodology or information about milk sharing. It conjures up the Hoary
Old Spectre of the slack alice mother, going on ebay to buy a shed load
of human milk, from the woman keeping her breast pump in the dog
basket. The crack whore is also selling her milk, when discussing
"Informal Milk Sharing." said crack whore has just come from her HIV
treatment centre (which is a problem actually, as she'll be on ARVs, but
let's not muddy the analogy with science!) That woman down the end of
the street with a fur coat and no knickers is involved in informal milk
sharing, and she's giving it to the daft woman at No 6, who buys stuff
from Internet channels as well.
However, when discussing Informed Milk Sharing, mothers are engaged in a
discourse with each other, and the science and research, on which is the
greater risk to their baby - donated human milk, or formula. They are
discussing screening options, and processing options. They are
scrutinising blood readouts and health check information. They are
deciding how to mitgate risks, so they are less than those of feeding
formula.
The removal of this aspect of the discussion, on various forums and
posts, is very troubling to me. The various milk sharing sites make
information known to all women, of the spectra of risks that can exist
in milk sharing. And most provide resources on how to mediate, or
mitigate, them.
To deny that element to the discussions, is to do a great disservice to
everyone.
So please, can we stop with the 'Informal Milk Sharing' and be
specific. You may as well just go straight to Icky Milk Sharing.
You may disagree with mothers making informed decisions on milk. You
may think it's a terrible idea. You may genunely believe that no mother
can mitigate the risks. But to present the concept as having no
discussion at all of the risks, is disengenous at best, and dishonest at
worst.
Mothers can undertake discussions about risk: let's not rob them of
that, no matter how we feel about Informed versus Uninformed, milk sharing.
Informed Milk Sharing is the activity under discussion.
Morgan Gallagher
(having a day of rants.) :-p
On 29/11/2010 09:50, Karleen Gribble wrote:
> A milk banking person saying how dirty and dangerous informal milk sharing
> is.... sigh...Jack Newman is quoted with similar sentiments in the same
> article. Very unhelpful and fits right in with the pervasive viewpoint that
> breastfeeding and breastmilk is icky, dangerous stuff that should be kept
> hidden- part of the reason why breastfeeding in public is so unacceptable
> and why working mums get such grief about their expressed breastmilk from
> their colleagues and from the carers of their infants. Shame! Shame!
> Karleen Gribble
> Australia
>
> http://www.thestar.com/living/article/898077--breast-milk-banks-latch-on-to-
> social-media
>
> However, the society does not endorse informal milk sharing. "I think it's
> dangerous," says Dr. Sharon Unger, a neonatologist at Mount Sinai Hospital.
> "I completely understand why women do it, but you really don't know what
> you're getting . . . it's very unsafe."
>
> Unger is spearheading an initiative to set up a Toronto milk bank, but says
> it's still a few years away - pending more research and funding - and will
> initially make sick babies its priority.
>
>
>
>
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