Judith Gelman writes:
>The statistic from the US Institute on Environmental Health Sciences on
>infant mortality is either misstated or an example of innumeracy.  The
>infant mortality rate in the US is about 8.4. Does anyone believe that
>not breastfeeding is responsible for HALF of those deaths?

The statistic from the US Institutue says that "For every 1,000 babies who
DIE, 4 of those babies died as a direct result of not having been
breastfed."  It does not say for every 1,000 babies BORN, of whom 8.4 will
die, half of them die from not having been breastfed.

In the grander scheme of things, the 4 extra babies out of every 1,000 who
die each year, who wouldn't have died if they had been breastfed, represent
just the tip of the iceberg.

How many babies are there who aren't breastfed, and don't DIE -- they
survive -- but they are permanently impaired because they were not
breastfed?  They might have asthma, attention deficit hyperactivity
disorder, allergies, multiple sclerosis, Crohn's Disease, breast cancer,
lymphoma, heart disease, diabetes, a lower IQ than otherwise (perhaps
rendering them learning disabled or mentally retarded) . . . . and the list
goes on and on and on.

And what about the emotional/psychological effects on all those children who
spent the first several years of their lives deprived of the most basic,
fundamental relationship between two people?  Most of the bottle-fed
children turn out "OK" -- but some don't, and for the rest, "OK" isn't as
good as it might have been.  If bottle-feeding ONLY killed an extra 4/1000
kids in the US each year, I might not care so much, nor battle so hard, but
many more childrn are permanently harmed each year by formula use.

In addition to those whose lives are permanently impaired, there must be
some "cost" reckoned in terms of the pain and suffering of children who --
while they may not have any permanent health, cognitive, or emotional
impairments from not being breastfed -- none-the-less had to suffer as
infants and young children from multiple ear infections, gastrointestinal
infections, upper respiratory tract infections, and so on . . . and on and
on.  Does anyone think it is "OK" for so many children to suffer so
needlessly simply because it doesn't do them any *permanent* damage??

Kathy Dettwyler