Hi Lara,
I've been emailing with one of the authors and he really doesn't get it. The 35% EBF is so ridiculously high that alarm bells would have been going off all over the place with any researcher with experience in infant feeding. And yes a shame that such poorly designed research gets so much publicity.
Karleen Gribble
Australia


O
> Has someone already mentioned the recall issue? The breastfeeding data
> is based on kindergarten-entrance recall. Its reliability is therefore
> heavily suspect. The study admits to this limitation, but not to the
> confounding issue, which for me is an even bigger one (as the bias is
> all in one direction). The study didn't even attempt the most basic
> exclusion of confounders - accounting for socioeconomic status. We know
> that higher socioeconomic status is correlated with around double the
> rate of diagnosed peanut allergy; and that higher socioeconomic status
> is also associated with higher breastfeeding rates. 
> 
> SES is perhaps one of the most obvious confounder there is for this kind
> of research, and even a medical student designing research for a
> hypothetical project would (and should!) be stomped down severely if
> they didn't attempt to account for it in some way. For me, ignoring it
> calls into question the scientific knowledge and competence of the
> people conducting this research. 
> 
> And yet, the media will love it, and the meme across the country will be
> "Science has proven that breastfeeding causes allergies".
> 
> Lara Hopkins 
> 
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