Experts ask for legally binding measures to combat the practices of this sector, which invests $ 3.5 billion per year to convince parents, health professionals and political leaders of the interest of their products.
by Sylvie Burnouf
How to explain that women are breastfeeding so little, even though the benefits of breast milk for health are no longer to be demonstrated? Around the world, only 48 % of babies are fed exclusively within the age of six months, as the World Health Organization (WHO) recommends. If the causes and circumstances of this reality are multiple, a group of international experts denounces, in a corpus of publications broadcast Wednesday, February 8 by the medical journal The Lancet, the role of major influence exercised by the manufacturers of maternal milk substitutes .
“For decades, the industry of infant trade milks has used sneaky marketing strategies, designed to take advantage of the fears and worries of the parents in a period when they are vulnerable, in order to make the Food of young children A business with several billion dollars, criticizes the review in an editorial accompanying the series of three articles. The manufacturers have garnered an immense economic power which they deploy at the political level to ensure a sub-regulation of the sector while limiting the resources granted to services that work in favor of breastfeeding. “
” They all influence us “
“What to understand is that we are not saying that all women should breastfeed – some cannot or do not wish -, or that it is necessary to prohibit the sale of Infantile milks, warns Professor Nigel Rollins, expert for this series of Lancet and pediatrician at WHO. Our criticism aims at business marketing strategies, not women. “
The analysis of researchers reveals that to promote their products – whose sales increased from $ 1.5 billion in 1978 to 55 billion in 2019 -, manufacturers in the artificial milks sector invest massively, $ 3.5 billion per year. “This makes them very powerful … Especially since this amount does not take into account lobbying, actions on social networks or the sponsorship of health professionals, points Nigel Rollins. I believe that we do not measure how much they All influence, parents, caregivers and political leaders. “
Experts describe their tactics, which range from the use of poor quality scientific data to instill the idea that substitutes are essential – to compensate for a low production of breast milk, improve the well -being of the baby (sleep , digestion …) or even promote its intellectual capacities -to the financing of learned companies and pediatrics, medical congresses and research associations, including lobbying actions to, for example, limit the adoption of measures favorable to breastfeeding, such as lengthening parental leave.
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