Washington, DC — On July 11, 2019, Dr. Christie del Castillo-Hegyi, Co-Founder of the Fed is Best Foundation and Jillian Johnson, Fed is Best Advocate and mother to Landon Johnson, who died from hypernatremic dehydration while exclusively breastfeeding, traveled to Washington, DC to provide testimonies to the 2020 USDA Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee. This is the first year that the Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA) have included pregnancy and birth to 24 months.
From December 2018 to January 2019, the Secretary’s Advisory Committee on National Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Objectives for 2030 published the proposed Healthy People 2030 Objectives for public comment. Of note, the proposed Healthy People 2030 objectives saw a marked change from the 2020 objectives, namely a reduction of the breastfeeding objectives from 8 goals to one, namely, “Increase the proportion of infants who are breastfed exclusively through 6 months” (MICH-2030-15 ). Among the objectives that were dropped from the list were:
| Healthy People 2020 Objectives | Baseline (%) | Target (%) |
|---|---|---|
| Increase the proportion of infants who are breastfed (MICH 21) | ||
| Ever | 74.0* | 81.9 |
| At 6 months | 43.5* | 60.6 |
| At 1 year | 22.7* | 34.1 |
| Exclusively through 3 months | 33.6* | 46.2 |
| Exclusively through 6 months | 14.1* | 25.5 |
| Increase the proportion of employers that have worksite lactation support programs (MICH 22) | 25† | 38 |
| Reduce the proportion of breastfed newborns who receive formula supplementation within the first 2 days of life (MICH 23) | 24.2* | 14.2 |
| Increase the proportion of live births that occur in facilities that provide recommended care for lactating mothers and their babies (MICH 24) | 2.9‡ | 8.1 |
Exclusive breastfeeding at discharge is a major risk factor for severe jaundice and dehydration. Both conditions can require in-hospital treatment and can result in permanently impaired brain development. Photo Credit: Cerebral Palsy Law
Another day, another distortion pushed by supporters of the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative, who no longer have any reasonable justification for endangering newborns with their policies, namely policies that increase the risk of accidental suffocation, newborn falls and starvation-related brain injury from strict exclusive breastfeeding promotion. Never in the history of Western medicine have we had decades of scientific evidence that a public health policy increases the risk of brain injury, disability and death in infants while millions of dollars are used to promote the policies’ “benefits” while actively suppressing knowledge of its risks. Since they no longer have any defense for their unsafe practices, they use the old and tired argument that anyone who criticizes or raises awareness on the safety issues of their policies must be funded and influenced by formula industry.
The most recent attempt to suppress the opinions of its critics occurred on December 18, 2018 when Women’s eNews published a highly biased and inaccurate article aimed at discrediting one of the BFHI’s critics, Dr. Ronald Kleinman, who published an editorial along with two other pediatricians, Dr. Joel Bass and Dr. Tina Gartley, in the medical journal JAMA Pediatrics regarding the serious safety issues associated with the BFHI protocol, entitled, Unintended Consequences of Current Breastfeeding Initiatives.
We are making preparations for #GivingTuesday! This year, Facebook and Paypal are joining to match up to $7 million of donations made to non-profit organizations through Facebook. Please consider logging on to our Facebook page at midnight on November 27, 2018 to make your donation to Fed is Best. Put it on your calendar!
This year, we are extending our campaign to hospitals and health officials. We have developed our information for hospitals page on the Fed is Best website and are developing our Fed is Best Foundation hospital guidelines for Safe Infant Feeding. We also plan to send our health professional advocates to Washington, D.C. to raise awareness on the safety issues that insufficiently fed newborns face on a daily basis.
Please help us in our mission. For those who would like to donate today or on a monthly basis, please consider going to our new donation page.
Thank you to all our supporters! #FedisBest
Full video presentation available at Contemporary Forums Online.
Las Vegas, Nevada — On September 6, 2018, the national neonatology conference, “The Fetus and Newborn Conference” was held in Las Vegas, Nevada. Among the speakers was Jay Goldsmith, M.D., Neonatologist and Professor of Pediatrics at Tulane University, Member of the American Academy of Pediatrics Section on the Fetus and Newborn who gave a talk entitled, “Is Baby-Friendly Baby Safe?”
In the talk, he discussed the case of an Oregon woman who has filed an $8.6 million lawsuit against her hospital, Portland Adventist Medical Center, and a nurse who cared for her and her baby after accidentally suffocating her newborn after falling asleep with him in her hospital bed. According to the Washington Post, she had delivered her son by cesarean section a few days earlier and was given narcotic pain medication and sleep aids. A nurse gave her newborn to her while she was still drowsy and groggy to breastfeed in her hospital bed. About an hour after being left to breastfeed, the baby was found gray, not breathing with compromised vital signs in the mother’s arms after which he was rushed to the nursery. The baby received CPR and was put on life support but the child sustained severe and permanent brain injury. He ultimately died at 10 days of age. Continue reading
