[On the BFHI & CH] " but the main point was that the hospital was
committed to encouraging new moms to breastfeed.  And that may be the
message that the average viewer got - no problem there."

Except that the "encouragement" that the hospital offered was
erroneous/ limited information, an LC who didn't ask about weight
gain, apparently no well-child check ups & no follow up.  I didn't see
the hospital as enouraging breastfeeding-- I saw it as failing
completely to support breastfeeding.  Unfortunately, I think the
average viewer will see that a hospital may place a lot of stress on
new moms to breastfeed, without backing that up with any support.  The
line about mothers "not using common sense, but relying on medical
advice" also, I think, reinforces the idea that breastfeeding is a
*medical* event to be controlled by doctors, rather than something
mothers CAN and SHOULD learn as much as they can about.



And the worst thing, IMO, is that this entire storyline was about
breastfeeding-- and ther was NO BREASTFEEDING at all in the show,
right?  A dead baby-- from breastfeeding.  The neighbor's happy baby--
being formula fed.  The doctor's sick & fussy baby-- breastfed.  It
seems incredibly hard to believe, to me anyway, that these images of
breastfeeding & formula feeding moms DON'T carry an overall negative
message to the average viewer.

Teresa