Hello, everyone.  My name is Jim Akre and I am a technical
          officer in the World Health Organization's Nutrition unit in
          Geneva, Switzerland.  I am pleased to join you all on this
          extraordinaryly eclectic electronic energy source.  Part of
          my job has to do with keeping tabs on what governments
          around the world are doing to, in the fairly dry jargon of
          international standard setting, <give effect to the
          principles and aim of the International Code of Marketing of
          Breast-milk Substitutes>.  To reply to those who have asked
          recently about whether the USA has <signed> the IC, in fact
          no government anywhere has ever <signed> the IC since it is
          not a ratifiable instrument in the same say that an
          international convention is, e.g. the Convention on the
          Rights of the Child (1989).  The Code was adopted by the
          World Health Assembly in May 1981 in the form of a
          recommendation.  Paragraph 1 of its article 11 concerning
          <implementation and monitoring> states:  <Governments should
          take action to give effect to the principles and aim of this
          Code, as appropriate to their social and legislative
          framework, including the adoption of national legislation,
          regulations or other suitable measures.>  Where action by
          the Government of the USA specifically is concerned, the
          Official Record of the fourth meeting of Committee A at the
          Forty-seventh World Health Assembly in May 1994 relates the
          statement made by the representative of the USA (Dr Sumaya)
          as follows:  <Although the United States Government
          supported the principles and aim of the International Code
          of Marketing of Breast-milk Substitutes, the Code contained
          provisions that could not be applied in the United States
          because they were inconsistent with domestic law and policy.
          Each Member State had to look at the International Code in
          the context of its own laws and practices, as had been the
          intent in making the Code voluntary;  the United States was
          no exception.>  Even prior to this formal declaration,
          however, portions of the IC had already <been given effect
          to> in the USA via public policy and programmes and
          legislation and regulations concerning, among other things,
          quality and labelling.

          James Akre (Mr)
          Technical Officer, Nutrition
          World Health Organization
          Geneva, Switzerland
          [log in to unmask]