The breast things in life are free

We said it before and we’ll say it again and again and again: Nothing beats breast milk. Absolutely nothing. Mothers around the world shed tears of sadness and anger over the recent news of milk formula contamination affecting over a thousand babies and causing the death of at least two infants.

Heard was the Baby Milk Action’s cry of dissent. Campaign coordinator Mike Brady laments the fact that powdered formula is by nature not sterile and the milk used in the formula may be contaminated by harmful pathogens such as enterobacter sakazakii and salmonella. And vital info is not provided on labels by milk companies. Some milk manufacturers even claim that their formula protects. The truth is, in the mass production of food products, including milk, it is natural for errors to occur. For instance, due to a mixing error, one milk formula was found to have excessive levels of copper, iron, and zinc. More and more babies die every year or get sick because milk formula fails to measure up to the incomparable standards of breastmilk. According to the World Health Organization, some 60,000 infants die every year due to inappropriate feeding.

Indeed, formula not only subjects vulnerable infants to infections. It also denies babies of the many God-given benefits of breastmilk.

Breastmilk is also the most friendly to the environment and climate. To celebrate World BreastfeedingWeek (WBW 2008), August 1 to 7, waste and pollution watchdog EcoWaste Coalition made a pitch for breastmilk as being “super nature-friendly,”   destroying no natural resources, burning no fossil fuel, and emitting no greenhouse gases that poison and warm the planet.

“Compared to the manufacture of infant milk formula, the all-natural production of breastmilk in a woman’s body does not that involve huge amounts of resources and fuels and the associated wastes. It’s super nature-friendly all the way, produced and delivered to a totally satisfied baby consumer without any pollution,” Elsie Brandes-de Veyra, an official of the EcoWaste Coalition, explains.“We therefore join the World Alliance for Breastfeeding Action (WABA), the Department of Health, and our tireless champions in the civil society in celebrating and defending this most ecological food that has nourished and sustained humanity for ages.” 

 The EcoWaste Coalition is particularly concerned with the adverse impact of the production, marketing, use, and disposal of commercial infant and baby foods on the world’s fast diminishing natural resources and the trash and pollution created in every phase of the trail.

“With the aggressive marketing of commercial breastmilk substitutes and the illegal dumps bursting at the seams, we find it critical that breastfeeding, a most eco-friendly act, is promoted, protected, and supported at all times and in all places,” states the EcoWaste Coalition.The EcoWaste Coalition is likewise concerned with the presence of bisphenol A or BPA, an industrial chemical, in polycarbonate plastic feeding bottles and in the lining on infant formula cans. Scientists are worried that BPA can leach out into the milk and warned about its toxic effects to the environment and humans, especially to newborns and infants.

WBW 2008 called for greater support for mothers in achieving the highest standard of infant feeding: exclusive breastfeeding for six months, and providing appropriate complementary foods with continued breastfeeding for up to two years or beyond.

Enough said.

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‘A-book-Saya’ vs Abu Sayyaf

Here’s an ardent appeal from the concerned parents of two Christian-Muslim children. Read it, be touched, and moved to action.

Dear Consumerline:   

Muslim child warriors are on the rise! Weeks ago, the military showed video footages of the MILF training young kids for war. Last Monday, several peace advocates were kidnapped in Tipo-Tipo, Basilan and the police claim it was the handiwork of 10 “minors’’ believed to be members of the Abu Sayyaf Group.   “What is alarming is that there were young boys, as young as around 12 years old. They (victims) estimated their ages as between 12 and 19, or teenagers,’’ Philippine Navy spokesperson Lt. Edgardo Arevalo said of the incident.  

Unfortunately, me and my wife Annora, a Tausug Muslim, no longer find the matter “alarming.’’ If you grow up with guns, what do you become? If you grow up with the culture of hatred, violence, distrust, and ignorance, what do you become?    So, what do we do to children who grew up thinking that the future depends on how they handle their guns? What do we do to children of war who grew up with guns and not books and better education? Kill them all?   For those of us who have teenage children, this is a very hard question to answer. For me and my wife, this piece of depressing development in Basilan only emboldened us even more to step up our efforts to flood Mindanao with books, magazines, and all kinds of reading materials to open up the eyes of young Christians and Muslims there to the reality that they have a better future picking up a book than a gun through our A-book-Saya Group (ASG).

Although I’m a Christian and my wife is a Muslim who grew up in Zamboanga City and Sulu, respectively, we had a common experience of having many guns in our childhood but remembering books to be very rare. Old newspapers could only be read as they were brought home wrapped in dried fish bought from the city. 

Our small project is a play on the word Abu Sayyaf Group (ASG) because we want to show how the giving of books could help stop one more potential terrorist or rebel from picking up guns or bombs. We’ll find fulfillment even if in our lifetime, our books could help stop only one or two potential terrorists from bombing civilians.

 We hope you could be part of our group and help us disseminate our ASG project to the public. Initially, we have designated our Satti Grill House outlets at SM Fairview Food Court and at the corner of MH del Pilar and Padre Faura as drop-off points for the books. Later, we hope to tie up with newspapers, private and government firms to help take in the books. 

Help make our ABSG fight the righteous fight not only against the ASG but the MILF, the MNLF, and Christian vigilantes groups as well. Help us expose poor children in war-torn Mindanao to books in the hope that they grow up to be professionals and peacemakers. 

Donors may contact us through telephone numbers 799-2745 and 339-3732 or cell phone numbers 09175208013 and 09195897879 or at www.sattisfaction.blogspot.com and zamboyo66@yahoo.com.

Armand And Ann Nocum

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We’d love to hear from you. E-mail us at ching_alano@yahoo.com.