It is a  bit ironic that, in the same Lactnet digest, there are two separate 
posts:   one asking that mothers send milk directly to a researcher; another 
describing a commerical milk bank that receives donor milk and turns around 
and sells it for profit after re-engineering.

This is new territory for us as IBCLCs.  I am very nervous about the way 
science and technology are racing ahead of our ability to build ethical 
(moral ... religious ... name your flavor) constructs to evaluate whether we 
want to be a party to this stuff.

It would behoove us all to check the details where we can.  If an IBCLC 
recommends that a mother should (or shouldn't) offer her precious breastmilk 
to anyone other than her own baby, it implies a *professional* endorsement 
of the enterprise.  Now -- the enterprise may well be admirable:  i.e. 
offering breastmilk for the cancer patient, or wet-nursing the baby of a 
mother who is sick, injured --or worse.

But that brings us back to the original premise:  know the details before 
you are giving the thumbs up or thumbs down on a suggestion of human milk 
donation.  Generally speaking, the more hands (or strata) that are involved 
in the enterprise, the more difficult it is to find out just who really is 
going to benefit from the use/study/sale/commericalization of the 
breastmilk.

Liz Brooks, JD, IBCLC
Wyndmoor, PA, USA

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