-----Original Message-----
From: Karleen Gribble <[log in to unmask]>

>Someone stated that adoptive Mums rarely manage full supply for their
>babies. I believe that this is commonly the case in western countries but
>have heard (both from a doctor that I have spoken to myself) and from
>written sources that adoptive Mums in Papua New Guinea are USUALLY able to
>provide all the milk their babies require.
>Anyone like to hazard a guess why?

I don't have the answer to this question, but I recently found a statement
in a booklet*  published in German by LLL by Elizabeth Hormann that mentions
this difference between "industrialized" and "developing" countries: "In
indurstialized countries one experiences (the fact) that the milk production
of adoptive mothers falls short of the amounts needed for full lactation.
Women in developing countries, on the other hand, tend to produce plenty of
milk under the same circumstances" {loosly translated from the German}. The
author goes on to say: "One can assume that psychocultural factors play a
role, but we do not yet know how they function."
She gives several examples of women in less developed countries (including a
woman who had never been pregnant as well as some grandmothers) who have
successfully kept orphaned or abandoned children alive by nursing them
fully.
     As an adoptive mother who breastfed my daughters 21 and 17 years ago
and achieved a fairly good but not a full milk supply both times, I was
intrigued by this. I wonder if I had just breastfed and been less involved
with diaper counts and growth charts if I could have done the same.

*"Stillen eines Adoptivkindes und Relaktation" (Nursing an Adopted Child and
Relactation) by E. Hormann

Anne Stiller, RNC, BSN, IBCLC in Virginia Beach, VA

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