Baby-Friendly: Failure and the Art of Misdirection

November 20, 2019May 7, 20241 Comment

By Alex Fischer, PhD Candidate, Brooke Orosz, PhD, Jody Segrave-Daly, RN, IBCLC, Lynnette Hafken, MA, IBCLC and Christie Del Castillo-Hegyi, M.D.

Any good magician will tell you that the secret to their trade is misdirection—making the audience look one way while doing something the other way. And even knowing this, most of us are still baffled by a magician’s tricks. So it’s no wonder that Baby-Friendly USA (BFUSA) has tried to employ that same tactic in their statement titled “Fact vs FIB: The Impact of Baby-Friendly on Breastfeeding Initiation Rates.” In this statement written by an anonymous author representing BFUSA, they attempt to dispute the findings of a recent study published in Journal of Pediatrics, “Outcomes from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 2018 Breastfeeding Report Card: Public Policy Implications” by Bass et al. This study examines the impact of statewide breastfeeding initiation rates as well as the impact of BFHI facilities on continued breastfeeding after hospital discharge (exclusive or combination). The Fed is Best Foundation read this study and agreed: “Baby-Friendly does not work.” These five words are the instigators of the entire statement by BFUSA and its misrepresentation of a very robust scientific study. Continue reading →

Nurses Quit Because Of Horrific Experiences Working In Baby-Friendly Hospitals

November 14, 2019May 7, 20241 Comment

Photo Credit: Victorian Agency for Health Information

We regularly receive messages from nurses, physicians, LCs, and other health professionals. They express their concerns while asking for help and patient resources. They tell us their stories and they need support and direction on what to do about unethical and dangerous policies they are forced to practice. We collected their stories and are beginning a blog series of health professionals who are now speaking out about the Baby-Friendly Health Initiative and the WHO Ten Steps of Breastfeeding.

Dianna Talter, Pediatric Emergency Department Nurse

I am a pediatric emergency department nurse traveler and sometimes, I worked on the mother-baby unit. I will never work on a mother-baby unit again because of the terrible conditions that mothers and babies are forced to endure because of the “Baby-Friendly” (BFHI) protocol!

Continue reading →

U.S. Study Shows Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative Does Not Work

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by Christie del Castillo-Hegyi, M.D.

On October 14, 2019, the Journal of Pediatrics published astonishing findings regarding the effects of the Baby-Friendly hospital certification on sustained breastfeeding rates as defined by the 2020 Healthy People Goals of:

any breastfeeding at 6 and 12 months
exclusive breastfeeding at 3 and 6 months.

They did so by measuring the relationship between statewide breastfeeding initiation rates data and the above breastfeeding rates. They then measured the contribution of Baby-Friendly hospital designation on these same breastfeeding outcomes.

According to the study authors, the increase in hospital designation in the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative (BFHI) began in 2011 when the U.S. Surgeon General issued a call to action for maternity care practices throughout the U.S. to support breastfeeding. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) became involved in promoting the BFHI policies in hospitals and health facilities, as breastfeeding was thought to be associated with lower rates of childhood obesity. The assumption was that by increasing breastfeeding rates through the BFHI, there would be a concomitant decline in childhood obesity. Upon initiation of this program, the CDC initiated surveillance of state-specific data on breastfeeding outcomes after discharge including BFHI designation rates. This data is made available to the public through the CDC Breastfeeding Report Card, which provides annual reports from 2007 through 2014 and biennial reports from 2014.

As expected, they found that states with higher breastfeeding initiation rates had higher rates of these sustained breastfeeding outcomes. You cannot have high breastfeeding rates unless mothers are given education and successfully initiate breastfeeding. However, when they measured the effects of Baby-Friendly certification, this is what they found.

“Baby-Friendly designation did not demonstrate a significant association with any post-discharge breastfeeding outcome (Figures 1, B and 2, B). There was no association between Baby-Friendly designation and breastfeeding initiation rates.” Continue reading →

Infant receiving phototherapy; safe feeding.

Read the Stories of Thousands of Families, Nurses and Physicians Who Signed the Fed is Best Petition

October 24, 2019February 6, 20241 Comment

Click to image below to read the comments and stories of thousands of families, nurses and physicians.

Fed is Best Philadephia Billboard Campaign

October 21, 2019May 7, 2024Leave a comment

Jody Segrave-Daly, RN, IBCLC and Christie del Castillo-Hegyi, M.D.

On October 16, 2019, the Fed is Best Foundation billboard went up on I-95 Northbound, 0.3 miles south of Bridge St. in the heart of Philadelphia. This billboard was purchased with donations from private family and health professional supporters of the Fed is Best Foundation. It was a billboard that did not mince words with regard to the risk of newborn brain injury and disability from insufficient feeding complications, namely phototherapy-requiring jaundice.

Since then, several anti-Fed is Best, lactivist groups have posted about the billboard showing their clear concern about the effects of fully informing the public of these serious risks of the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative. We are saddened to see them express little concern about the harm caused to babies and their families by a policy that routinely shames families who choose to use formula, normalizes signs of persistent infant hunger and exaggerates the risks of formula while hiding the risk of brain injury from insufficient feeding while exclusively breastfeeding.