MPs back fresh curbs on "misleading" formula milk marketing claims

A Scottish National party MP has received unanimous Commons backing for new legislation to curb “misleading and scientifically questionable claims” around the marketing of formula milk for babies.

Alison Thewliss introduced her proposal, which has cross-party support, via the 10-minute rule in the House of Commons on Wednesday. After gaining parliamentary approval with no opposition, she can now bring a draft bill for legislation governing the marketing of replacement breast milk products into line with World Health Organisation policy for a second reading before parliament in February.

Although the WHO introduced an international marketing code more than 30 years ago to prevent aggressive practices in formula milk promotion, the UK has never fully implemented it.

Thewliss, MP for Glasgow Central, said legislation was needed to tackle a legal loophole that allows “scientifically questionable” claims about the health benefits of formula milk to be printed in reputable medical and nursing journals.

Thewliss said: “I believe it is vitally important that parents get accurate information on the contents of formula milk, and the best way to prepare it safely. At present there is a worrying lack of independent scrutiny of infant and young child formula, as well as growing frustration about the industry marketing tricks and misleading claims being pushed on parents and health professionals alike.”

The move, which is backed by the chair of the Commons health select committee, the Conservative Dr Sarah Wollaston, has also drawn support from midwives.

Gillian Smith, director of the Royal College of Midwives Scotland, said that, as an MP for a city centre constituency where breastfeeding rates were low and health outcomes poor, Thewliss was to be congratulated.

Smith added that the UK as a whole continued to have higher rates of formula feeding than many other European countries. “I do think adverts for follow-on milk do influence mothers. We are not bad at initiating breastfeeding, but not so good at sustaining it, and there is a significant drop-off by six months,” she said.

While the benefits of breastfeeding in protecting infants from infection and diseases have been shown in countless clinical trials, there are still many instances when formula milk may often be safer or help to resolve nutrient deficiencies.

Thewliss insisted she came to the debate “with absolutely no judgment or attempt to tell other parents how to feed their children”.

She said: “I understand there is a genuine and sincere requirement for infant formula milk for mothers who can’t or indeed don’t wish to breastfeed, and any number of circumstances which lead parents and carers to choose formula.”

MPs back fresh curbs on "misleading" formula milk marketing claims

Baby boys and women must get distinct formula milk, claim scientists

Levels of nutrients in baby milk have effects on a child’s growth, behaviour and temperament that might final a lifetime. Photograph: Alamy

Child formula ought to be tailored for boys and girls to reflect the differences in milk that mothers make based on their baby’s intercourse, researchers say.

Tests on mothers’ milk in both monkeys and people have showed that levels of body fat, protein, nutritional vitamins, sugars, minerals and hormones fluctuate enormously, but there is evidence that milk made for female and male babies is constantly distinct.

The make-up of the milk has a direct influence on the child’s development, but also on his or her behaviour and temperament, which might last for the rest of their daily life. Scientists suspect that breast milk could be tailored by nature to meet the diverse development demands of the sexes.

The findings have led some researchers to suggest that little one formula need to come in boy and girl formulations to match the distinctions observed in breast milk.

“We have good explanation to be sceptical of a one-dimension-fits-all formula,” stated Prof Katie Hinde, an evolutionary biologist at Harvard University.

Speaking at the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Chicago, Hinde described her operate in rhesus monkeys that showed mothers produce milk with 35% far more excess fat and protein for male babies, and even richer milk when the male was 1st-born.

But when mothers fed female infants, their milk was significantly less fatty and had far more calcium, most likely to assistance the quicker growth of their skeletons. Mothers developed a lot more milk overall for females, and in excess of the program of their breast feeding, they obtained the exact same volume of body fat as the males.

“The recipes for milk for sons and daughters could be diverse, and the variation could be higher depending on where the mom is at in her reproductive career,” mentioned Hinde.

“Boys and ladies have various developmental trajectories, so if they are not acquiring what they need to have, their growth will not be optimal.”

In one more study, Hinde looked at levels of the pressure hormone cortisol in mothers’ milk and how they affected the babies’ behaviour. The research builds on previous function in people that found milk with larger concentrations of cortisol made infant girls much more irritable and more difficult to calm down.

Hinde measured ranges of cortisol in breast milk for 108 little one monkeys at a single month previous, and later on when the animals have been three or 4 months old. She found some subtle but important variations. Female monkeys grew to become more nervous when cortisol was large early on in their breast feeding. Male monkeys behaved more nervously when cortisol rose in excess of time.

Taken with each other, the perform suggests that mothers make breast milk in a different way for male and female babies, and that male and females react to the milk they drink in their personal ways.

Hinde said far a lot more work was necessary to understand not only how and why milk varies for boys and girls, but also why constituents of milk impact them in different ways.

Baby boys and women must get distinct formula milk, claim scientists