I absolutely agree with what my good friend says. Bottle feeding tends to be at a set time—“Is it time for the baby’s feed yet?”—rather than when the baby actually needs to be fed, whereas breastfed babies are fed little and often on demand, which is a slightly better habit to get into.
There is also a beneficial effect on breastfeeding mothers. As well as reducing the risk of cancer and diabetes, breastfeeding burns calories and helps to get mothers back to their pre-maternity weight—for me the prospect of burning an extra 400 to 500 calories just by breastfeeding my baby was very attractive, and it certainly helped me to fit back into the clothes that I wore before I had my children, both of whom were breastfed for two years.
I was interested in the findings of the Select Committee report, and I particularly note the points about marketing and sugar content in foods. I was a wee bit disappointed that it does not contain much discussion on baby foods and toddler milks, as there are significant issues in that area regarding the advertising and the content of the products. In evidence to the Committee, Dr Colin Michie of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health stated:
“Follow-on formulas are not necessary for human beings, but it would not seem so if you watch television. The problem is we are all very convinced by the stories. There are other issues that have parallels for what was said earlier in that the milk companies sponsor education, training, events and an awful lot of professional activities, which again does exactly, to our minds, what we heard it does to infants’ minds: when we see brand names, we equate certain things with them. It is an insidious business that we know enough of to be very wary of.”
The artificial creation of a market for follow-on or toddler milks is of some concern, because those products are not subject to the same level of scrutiny as formulas for very young babies. Research gathered by the First Steps Nutrition Trust suggests that
“Growing-up milks and toddler milks contain almost twice as much sugar per 100 ml as cow’s milk, and some Aptamil and Cow & Gate growing-up milks and all SMA growing-up milks contain vanilla flavouring. It is unclear whether repeated exposure to sweet drinks in infancy and toddlerhood might contribute to the development of a preference for sweet drinks in later life.”
It is important to take cognisance of that and consider the issue as part of the obesity strategy.